


Devil's Advocate

by sadlymelodramatic



Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Character Study, Explicit Language, Grief/Mourning, Interspecies Relationship(s), Mental Health Issues, Multi, Slow Burn, Spacer (Mass Effect), Trauma, War Hero (Mass Effect)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-14
Updated: 2019-09-23
Packaged: 2020-06-28 00:12:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 22,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19800694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sadlymelodramatic/pseuds/sadlymelodramatic
Summary: Despite the running joke that death simply couldn’t keep her down, Shepard was haunted by her death on the first Normandy. It came to her in bits and pieces – the soft hiss of oxygen escaping her breached suit, the taste of her desperate tears on her lips, the absolute silence of open space. No one can know how it pains her, not on a ship where the walls have ears and every set of prying eyes scrutinize all she does. Nothing is sacred. Nothing is safe. The Commander keeps her secrets close to her chest.Trapped on Omega, Livia guarded the secrets of Aria T'Loak with what little of a life she had left. Far from home and slipping further into her delusions, the appearance of a certain resurrected Commander in Afterlife offers a new choice: stay Aria's pet infiltrator or die fighting the Collectors. The choice is easy enough but the new friendships she's forced to navigate open a few too many wounds. Luckily, the Commander makes for an eager partner in trauma.





	1. Manic

**Author's Note:**

> Born from my utter hatred of the obnoxious and irritating Kelly Chambers, I was hoping to imagine a more realistic take on both the psychological and emotion trauma experienced by the Normandy crew as well as a bit of Shakarian love in the interim. 
> 
> Given that I think Kelly Chambers is a woeful attempt at character whose defining feature is being a psychologist, I thought that the story needed a new one. Who is actually...you know...human. Not a robot who just spouts occasional inspirational quotes and tries to find the "good" in everyone. Damn, I really apologise to anyone who actually likes Kelly Chambers but anywho - enjoy the ride everyone. This might be a long one. 
> 
> Just a couple of notes on my version of Shepard:   
> \- Kiera Shepard   
> \- Spacer Background (I love Hannah Shepard too much, I'm sorry)   
> \- War Hero

* * *

** Prologue: Manic **

* * *

_April, 2184 - Omega, Terminus Systems_

Despite Aria’s grand speeches about the freedom of Omega, Livia couldn’t help but feel as if the walls of Afterlife were constricting to keep her inside.

The club was alight with neon colours and a kind of haze that only Hallex could provide. Asari dancers curled themselves around their poles, the flashing lights reflecting off their skin-tight outfits, and batarians gathered at the bar below with faces upturned to the spectacle. The red glow of Afterlife had them under a powerful spell. It kept them right where Aria wanted them - enchanted and oblivious to the gun she held at their back.

It was a smart move. No leader ever inspired loyalty without offering a few benefits in return. Aria knew that better than most, despite her harsh methods and abrasive exterior. She kept the bar stocked and the dancers on the pole, efficiently subduing any grudges she might have caused and silencing any notion of rebellion in her ranks. It was a measured balance of command and comradeship that even the most seasoned Alliance admirals would be envious of.

But it seemed that Livia had upset that balance and as she remained confined within the grimy, neon lined walls, the prospect of escape seemed further away than ever.

Aching for a cigarette, Livia clasped her hands together in her lap. The smell of Noverian rum permeated the booth, though it was arguably better than the stench of sweat and rust that lingered in the lower levels. As she looked back toward the bar, the batarian group dispersed as a new dancer came up to the pole. Anxiety pooled in her gut, soft voices whispering behind her ear.

_He left her._

_What might she do now?_

_She’s got nowhere left._

_No one else to help either._

_She’ll have to make a run for it._

_Escape the station. Hide away._

_He left her_

_He left._

_He left her behind. He left._

_He left. He’s gone!_

Livia closed her eyes. Her mania was rising, bubbling inside her chest. The voices were a nuisance but they were only temporary. It would all be over in a month, granted she survived whatever punishment Aria came up with. She’d find a new hole to hide in while her mind brought itself back to normal. The plan was always the same: ride out the depressive phase, find an equilibrium and then start anew. She may be alone but it wasn’t the end. She’d find a way out. She always did.

_"'Let them court-martial me. It'll be worth it for a few months with you."_

Livia felt as if her spine was being ripped from her back, her heart torn from her chest, her bones snapped clean in half. The image of Caius' face, the teal colony marks curved under his eyes and his forehead against hers. She recalled the feel of his mandibles against her fingertips, how he flinched as she touched them and then eased into her palm. The deep timbre of his voice warmed her chest like whiskey and his arm around her waist held her upright as her legs threatened to give way. 

The memory was as visceral as the pain it caused. Livia clenched her jaw and held her breath, doing her best to clear her mind. The voices grew in volume. 

_He’s gone he’s gone he’s gone he’s gone HE’S GONE_

_He'll never come back Never should've listened Weak Stupid A child_

_idiot idiot idiot idiot IDIOT._

For the first time since arriving in Omega, Livia wished the music was just a little louder. Her head ached from one of the many blows Aria’s henchmen had dealt, her blood congealing along her temple, and the world seemed to sway as she fought to stay conscious. Her dark curls were loose, sticking to the sweat and blood on her shoulders, and the bloody taste of iron tainted her tongue. She was losing blood… _somewhere_. The sheer amount of pain she felt all over her body made it difficult to pinpoint exactly which wound was causing her light-headedness but still, she was alive.

At best, that meant Aria had more planned for her than a simple death. At worst, those plans might just entail a slow, _painful_ death.

Taking a seat on her throne, the ruler of Omega kept her eyes forward. Anto stood rigid at her side, his face hard and unforgiving as he wiped the blood from his knuckles onto his pants. Livia’s blood. He did his best not to look her way.

“So,” the asari began, taking a quick sip from her glass, “I’d assume you know why you’re here.”

Aria’s voice grated against her ears, slicing through the cloud of ghostly voices that swirled around Livia’s head. Her steel blue eyes were cold, a shiver racing down her spine as she locked eyes with the Pirate Queen.

She’d known the risks of lying to Aria. She wasn’t ignorant of the danger she’d put herself in but, for the briefest of moments, Livia had convinced herself that it was all in the name of something good. Something for herself, something she could rely on, something to put her trust in. The sound of Caius’ laugh rang in her ears.

_Stupid girl. Always daydreaming._

_Scared of the real world now? Hopeless romantic_

_Never learns. When will she learn?_

_As mad as her mother Or even madder_

Livia shook her head but the voices remained. As she leaned back, she tried her best to keep her face from betraying the pain that ricocheted through her chest.

“Haven’t the faintest idea,” she said, choking on the end of her sentence. With her nails digging into the upholstery, she fought to keep her composure. “Though I never knew Anto could backhand that hard.”

Aria scoffed and took a swig from her glass, a frown creasing her brow. “That’s not exactly what I’d call an apology, _Livia_.” 

Aria hung on her name, drew out the syllables and clenched her jaw at the sound. She glared at her captive, no doubt waiting for a flinch, but Livia wouldn’t give her the satisfaction. The voices, however, roared in reply.

_Dead, dead, she’s dead Didn’t cover her tracks_

_Stupid Naïve Thought she could run_

_What was the use of all that training?_

_Dead as a doornail._

_Dead Dead Dead Dead Dead Dead_

Livia’s hands itched for a blade but she stifled the urge to fight. Her mind raced, searching for an excuse. Diplomacy was her only hope now, for she was in no condition to fight her way out.

“I didn’t lie about the things that mattered,” she said. “I told you I deserted the Alliance. Cut and ran – you think I was gonna use my real name after that? You couldn’t have expected me to trust you with that—"

“I _expect_ nothing,” Aria interrupted. Her blue eyes flared with anger and at her side, Anto tensed. “However, I do _demand_. I have no time for expectations and half-assed promises. I demand and receive. That’s it.”

Livia rolled her eyes, feigning bravado. Maybe a show of strength would tide her over. “The Alliance can’t touch Omega, Aria. _You_ made sure of that. You honestly think I would’ve come here if they could just waltz in unannounced? I needed a safe place, somewhere to hide. There’s no place better than Omega for that.”

Aria almost smirked, the corners of her mouth twitching upward before falling back into her signature scowl. “This wasn’t the first place you came to and I’m sure, if I hadn’t done a little digging, it wouldn’t have been the last. So, leave your empty compliments to the psychos you used to treat.”

Silence engulfed their exchange as Livia’s thundering heart sank, a weary feeling of defeat surging through her veins. Despite her best efforts, conversation wouldn’t save her from Aria. She wasn’t Commander Shepard, heroically convincing Saren to blow his brains out. She was just a girl who should’ve known better than to be in that situation in the first place. Her father’s words began to mingle with the voices that taunted her, growing louder by the second.

_“Talk enough and you’ll just die with your tongue in a knot.”_

For all her mother’s talk on the importance of words, they were yet to do her any good. Her father’s empty promises, her mother’s delusions, Caius’ oh so convincing declarations of love – all of them, just well-hidden traps.

With a heavy sigh, Livia looked out over the bar. It wasn’t the place she’d hoped to die – far from home, bloodied and alone – but it wasn’t the worst of places. She could’ve gone out on the Citadel when Sovereign attacked, when a psychotic patient charged at her with scissors, when her mother…there were a lot of worse places to die.

“What now then, Aria?” she asked, her voice low and cracking on the edge of tears. “Am I going out by firing squad? A slit throat? Maybe even flaying, just for a little fun?”

The Pirate Queen chuckled, took another swig of her drink and then rose from her throne. She almost seemed regal, if only it weren’t for the murderous glint in her eye and the towering batarian bodyguard at her side.

“Don’t worry. I’m not going to kill you just yet,” she replied. “I can put your extra skillset to use elsewhere…unless you really do want to find out how you die.”

In an odd truce, Aria offered her drink to Livia’s battered and bloodied form. Though the voices raged in her ear and her natural instincts screamed at her to run, her mania had just taken hold.

There were worse places in the galaxy. There were worse people to be around. No one could touch her here. No could leave her behind. And if she spilled a little blood before she earned the right to leave, that’d be more than alright. Her anger had to go somewhere before it burned her up inside.

_“If only you’d be worth all this.”_ Caius’ voice joined the choir inside her head. Her rage raised her blood to a boil and despite the pain, she rose to her feet.

With shaking hands, she took the drink from Aria’s hand. The Noverian rum was bitter, almost cheap, but Livia savoured the taste nonetheless. “Back to work then.”

Aria smiled, hand on her hip, and turned toward the stairs. “Back to work.”


	2. We Happy Few

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "We few, we happy few, we band of brothers. For he today that sheds his blood with me, Shall be my brother..." - 'King Henry V', William Shakespeare.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Would you look at that? Only took me a bottle of wine to finish editing this...really living up to my wine aunt status.

* * *

** Chapter 1: We Happy Few **

* * *

In the grand stories her mother used to read to her, heroes always died with courage. They never faltered in their duties – to love, to country, to humanity. They never looked back on who they left behind; their eyes cast forward as they charged headlong into danger. They never made mistakes, never questioned their decisions, never found fault in themselves no matter how horrifying the consequences of their choices proved to be. In the stories, it was easy for heroes to die without fear. They were martyrs, not tragedies, and though she wished with all her childish heart to be like them, Shepard’s life had grown far beyond the adventurous tales read to her in the dimly lit bunks of an Alliance dreadnought.

In the end, those stories had been just that; stories. In the end, there was no valiant charge into battle, no dying love for all she stood for, no nothing. In the end, she died utterly terrified.

Small things ignited the memory of that fear, tiny snippets of her last moments cast out into the expanse of space: the soft hiss of her breached oxygen tanks sounded in her ear, the weightlessness of space that carried her gently toward the plant’s outer atmosphere, how each breath rose and fell until she could do nothing but sob and choke on dwindling air.

There was nothing courageous about dying. There was only fear, the most basic and carnal of human instincts, to guide her over to the other side. That fear would've been the last thing she’d ever felt, the last emotion surging through her veins as her oxygen dispersed into open space.

But Cerberus had other ideas.

Sat up in her cabin on the _Normandy_ SR-2, Shepard couldn’t help but feel as if the whole thing were a trap. The ship itself was breathtaking familiar, with Joker at the helm and the galaxy map flickering to life as she stepped up on the podium in the CIC. She could almost forgive herself for thinking nothing had changed at all, as if Ashley hadn’t been lost on Virmire and the insanity of Saren and Sovereign had just been some fanciful dream.

But then, Miranda would appear in her skin-tight uniform with Jacob in tow and her delusion shattered into a million pieces. This was not her Normandy. It was an imposter flying Cerberus colours that would be far from easy to remove. The organisation was an integral part of this new Normandy, from the AI that controlled the weapons systems to her utterly alien crew aboard. Never before had Shepard wished so desperately for Garrus’ dry humour or Liara’s frantic excitement over even the smallest Prothean artefact. The sound of Kaiden’s voice, calling her away from the helm as the Normandy was torn apart, followed her through the ship. But worst of all, there just was so much silence. It was almost suffocating, as if the walls were closing in and the air was being squeezed from her lungs yet again. There was no running from it – not even the safety of her cabin reassured her – and wherever she went, a firm and dreadful feeling of being watched pressed down hard on her shoulders.

On the brink of tears, Shepard took a breath. _No weakness here,_ she thought. _Can’t let them see you fall._

The dossiers for new crew members sat ignored on her desk as she pulled her knees to her chest. She was yet to look at herself in the mirror, to trace the cracks along her cheeks and the glow of cybernetics beneath. They were a stark reminder that her death had been as real as Sovereign or Saren, not some far off figment of her scattered imagination. The red glow beneath her skin seemed insistent on reminding her how she'd suffocated in the vacuum of space, alone and terrified as _her_ Normandy crumbled in the background. She’d been mourned and memorialised, her crew - her _friends_ \- scattered across the galaxy in the wake of her sudden death.

The whole charade felt like a waste of time. What place did she have in this world anymore? What could she possibly offer anymore but tired warnings fallen on deaf ears? She'd told anyone that would listen that the Reapers were coming, that they would all soon be in unimaginable trouble, but her voice had been silenced. Two years had gone by and the galaxy was stagnant, even as human colonies disappeared without a trace. 

_Worthless_ , she thought with a sigh. _It was all so worthless_. 

As anxiety twisted her insides into knots, Shepard let her feet slump to the floor. Her face fell into tired frown and her tears dried up, the swell of emotion dying down in her chest. She couldn’t let her guard down on this new, false Normandy. Cerberus was everywhere here and though she felt as if she were one side-eye away from total collapse, Shepard knew she couldn’t fall apart just yet.

_Don’t let them see you fall_ , she thought again. _They can’t see you fall down. Not yet_.

With shaking hands, she picked up the dossiers.

The first of them was easily the simplest, though enigmatic at best. Something about it felt familiar but like the Normandy, Shepard cast aside the thought out of fear. _There’s nothing familiar here_ , she thought. _Just old ghosts in a new vessel_.

__________

**_ ARCHANGEL _ **

  * _Small-unit tactical expertise_
  * _Omni-tool expert and noted sniper_



_  
Archangel is a mercenary commander whose operations are noted for their technical expertise and strategic brilliance. He is responsible for high-profile attacks on gang leaders on Omega and can likely be found there._

___________

Whoever had written the Cerberus dossiers clearly had a love for concisely put information. Shepard hated it. How was she supposed to recruit these people into her team if she knew nothing about them but their skill in killing? How could she trust them if she didn’t know them at all?

“ _Shepard!_ ”

The sound of Kaiden’s voice bellowed behind her ear, the same voice that called out to her as she raced to get Joker out of the pilot’s seat. Her heart skipped a beat and she near jumped out of her own skin, the hair on the back of her neck standing on end. Her head swivelled around to check for someone behind her but there was nothing - no one - to see. The moans and creaks of the new Normandy filled the void of silence that engulfed her cabin. Her senses were screaming, insisting something was wrong, but with no threat in sight, Shepard settled back into her seat.

Making a mental note to ask Dr Chakwas about the extra side effects of her cybernetics, Shepard moved on to the next dossier. It was short, impersonal and dry but it was blissfully free of any familiarity.

___________

**_ Dr. MORDIN SOLUS _ **

  * _Biological weapons expert_
  * _Light weapons training with Salarian Special Tasks Group_



_  
Dr. Mordin Solus is a salarian biological weapons expert whose technology may hold the key to countering Collector attacks. He is currently operating a medical clinic in the slums of Omega._

____________

“Great,” Shepard sighed. “More things to do on Omega.”

Still shaken by the sound of Kaiden’s voice, she pulled a notepad from the desk drawer. The obnoxious Cerberus symbol sat emblazoned atop the header and despite her distinct urge to hurl the pad out of the airlock, Shepard scribbled across the bleached white paper.

**ARCHANGEL – SNIPER, SEEMINGLY NO PERSONALITY. HOPEFULLY NOT A LONE WOLF TYPE - TOO DIFFICULT TO DEAL WITH.**

**SOLUS – MAD SCIENTIST. ~~PROBABLY~~ MAYBE A LOOSE CANNON. WHO THE HELL THOUGHT BRINGING A GENOPHAGE EXPERT ONTO THE TEAM WOULD BE A GOOD IDEA?**

Another sigh falling from her lips, Shepard dropped her pen onto the notepad and turned back to the dossier. She felt better with her thoughts written down, a little bit of her anger dispersed onto the page. There weren't too many places she could be candid, especially on an enemy ship. Taking another pause from the dossier, Shepard shook her head.

_Too raw_ , she thought, running her fingers over the fresh ink. _Can’t let them see it_. Tearing the paper from the pad, she lobbed the remnants of her inner thoughts across the cabin.

_Not even a single thought to myself_ , she thought as she hunched over her desk. _Fucking bullshit, fucking Cerberus_.

The next dossier was the last she could stand to read for the night.

___________

**_ LIVIA CONTI _ **

  * _Exceptional in infiltration and espionage._
  * _Hand-to-hand specialist, known best for working with knives but trained in small firearms._
  * _Alliance deserter – reasons unknown._



_Livia Conti is a former Alliance psychologist trained in espionage and infiltration, specialised in hand-to-hand combat. Notoriously slippery, she was last reported to have been seen in Afterlife on Omega. Intel is almost a year old and she’s likely moved on but could start there._

____________

The prospect of having yet another psychologist onboard turned Shepard’s stomach. Kelly Chambers wasn’t exactly the most endearing of people, though she seemed desperate to appeal to the rest of the crew as friendly and empathetic. Her qualifications in psychology, far from aiding her, only seemed to gain her contempt. Would another Kelly Chambers really make the team more cohesive?

Admitting defeat, Shepard pushed herself away from the desk. Omega could wait. The dossiers could wait. Hell, the Collectors could wait too, though she doubted they’d stop for her sake. She needed sleep, or liquor, or even just a simple cup of coffee, though none of which would come easily.

Running a hand through her still damp hair, Shepard conceded herself to sleep and made her way to bed.

“ _You exist because we allow it_.”

The sound of Sovereign’s voice vibrated through her body, sending her stumbling back onto the stairs. It was louder than Kaiden, so loud that her ears began to ring, and violent shivers wracked her entire body as she collapsed onto the floor. Her breathing slowed and her chest constricted, panic quickly taking over.

_“You will end because we demand it.”_

Despite having her hands over her ears, Sovereign only got louder. It was as if she were back on the Citadel, surrounded by rubble, fire and chaos. The lives of thousands were in her shaking hands and she barely knew what to do. Shepard shook her head. “It’s not real. It's not real. It’s not _fucking_ real,” she whispered. “It’s just a voice, a side effect.”

_“The time of our return is coming.”_

The world around her rumbled and Shepard closed her eyes. Like a child in the dark, she pressed her forehead to her knees and curled into herself. She stayed still, though still shivering in fear, and began to count her breaths in an effort to calm herself.

_One_. There was no monster here.

_Two_. The Reapers couldn't hurt her yet

_Three_. She was in her cabin, on the Normandy.

_Four_. She was safe. She was home, or as close to it as she could get.

_Five_. She was alone.

The room was silent once more, with only the gentle hum of the Normandy's engines sounding through the walls, but Shepard couldn’t bring herself to move or even look around her cabin. The floor was the safest place for her, in that moment, and with her hands over her ears, she fought to keep her breathing in check. She kept her eyes closed and her body hunched, no longer caring if the Illusive Man saw her tears. 

The bravery of her mother's stories may have been a lie but the monsters were real and Shepard wasn't sure if she could face them all on her own. 

* * *

The Commander was looking a little worse for wear when she wandered into Afterlife with her Cerberus handlers in tow. Perhaps it was the lighting, or the angle from which Livia observed the infamous war hero, but the reality of Commander Shepard was significantly different to the stories and intel she’d been collecting over the past few weeks. Her red hair was limp around her face and her mouth was set in a persistent scowl that rivaled even Aria’s most bitter of expressions. She moved through the crowds with a tired sense of urgency, as if she were here more out of obligation than any of the real passion that had defined her pursuit of Saren. In a way, Livia understood her exhaustion. After all, the glow of cybernetics beneath the cracks on her left cheek was nearly impossible to ignore.

Cerberus had truly resurrected her but now, it seemed, they’d called in a return for all they were indebted.

Stuck behind the bar, Livia watched as the trio marched up to Aria’s perch in the upper levels. She’d known they were coming – Cerberus scouts were far from subtle at the best of times – but the reasons as to why they were on Omega proved difficult to ascertain. Bar from rumours and incoherent ramblings about missing human colonies, Livia had found nothing that could warrant the Commander’s sudden return. The Illusive Man was undoubtedly living up to his name.

An unnatural excitement ignited in the pit of Livia's gut. Grabbing a bottle of Noverian rum, she poured herself a glass. Her fingers shook as she unscrewed the cap, adrenaline pumping through her veins, and she nearly missed the glass entirely before she filled it to the brim. Her thoughts began to race, sounding almost like the voices that plagued her back when Caius abandoned her.

_Close to escape. Don’t fuck it up. Don’t screw it up. You know the consequences. Aria’s always watching, you know she is. Keep your cool. Don’t fuck it up. You’ve survived this long. Don’t ruin it. Don’t ruin it. DON’T RUIN IT!_

The glass was empty by the time her thoughts slowed down but the buzz of excitement still thrummed in the beating of her heart. More rum was an obvious must.

As Livia poured herself another glass, a cold gaze settled on the movement of her hands. Raising the glass to her lips, she smirked. “Looking for something, Forvan?”

The batarian stifled a growl. “You’re gonna have to pay for that, human.”

Livia rolled her eyes and leaned back against the bar. Forvan’s ashen skin appeared even paler under the bar’s luminescent glow and the frown that graced his features only added to his overall unpleasant demeanour. In her manic state, Livia couldn’t help but add to his foul mood.

“Pay for it _how_ exactly?” she asked, taking another swig. “I mean, I’d offer to get us a room but humans don't really seem to be your taste. Especially with all the drink spiking and whatnot.”

Forvan snarled and snatched at her bottle, though she leaned back just enough to render it out of reach. “This isn’t your personal collection. Drink out of your own damn pay.”

“If I drank out of my own pay, then I’d be as miserable and sober as you.” Livia gave the batarian a wave, stepping out from behind the bar. “Besides, I’m the only one that drinks this shit.”

Forvan didn't bother offering a response as he slinked back to his post. For all his talk about killing of humans, there was little surety in the way the batarian handled himself around her. The psychologist in her detected a little trauma but that part of her was buried so deep inside that the thought barely warranted consideration.

With her new bottle of rum tucked under her arm, Livia made her way to the upper bar. Aria would no doubt want her to keep an eye on the Commander and her Cerberus friends, just as she always wanted outsiders to be watched on Omega. After a year on the station, Livia had become accustom to the rhythm of Aria’s demands. The details varied but the structure was always the same – go here, watch from afar, keep the outsiders from fucking with the balance of power, return to Afterlife. Simple and cyclical. Nothing to think too hard about while she raced to reach the bottom of the bottle.

The music was louder in the upper levels, practically vibrating through the floor, and the neon glow of the cylinder at the centre of the club turned Livia's skin purple under the light. It’d been months since she’d seen any sun. The olive tan of her adolescence had long since faded away and the memories of her youth – brown legs knee deep in the ocean tide, the bitter smell of sea salt on her pillow, a splash of red across her mother’s newest canvas – were rapidly fading with it. All except one.

_The sound of her mother’s feet shuffling along the floorboards. Splinters in her palm underneath the kitchen table. The glint of a blade under the moonlight_.

Livia abandoned her glass and drank straight from the source instead. The memory dispersed as the rum slid down her throat. She pressed on and ascended the stairs to Aria’s booth.

A datapad in her hand, Aria didn’t bother looking up at her subordinate. “You’re late.”

“Shocker.” The rum bottle was feeling awfully light in her fingers. “How was the great and mighty Shepard?”

“Odd. Jumpy. Strangely…desperate.”

“You trying to get my psychological opinion?”

“I’m certainly not looking for smartass commentary.” Aria glared over the top of her pad, her eyes drifting from Livia’s face to the bottle in her hand. “This is early, even for you.”

Livia shrugged, struggling to hide her annoyance. “You gonna tell me where they headed off to? Or are we just shaming my budding alcoholism now?”

Aria tossed her datapad to the side and crossed her arms over her chest. Her scowl was as unwavering as ever but there was something new in her expression. Something…violent. “They’ve gone to find Archangel,” she explained, “and Mordin Solus, of all people, but rather interestingly…they asked about you.”

All of a sudden, Aria’s agitation made a little more sense. Scrambling to pick her jaw up off the floor, Livia felt anxiety swell inside her chest. “That…they—what the fuck do they want with me?”

“I don’t know,” said Aria. “Perhaps you could enlighten me.”

Livia shook her head, already answering the silent question that hung in the air. “Aria, if I wanted to escape Omega, I don’t think absconding with a long dead Alliance Spectre and her Cerberus bodyguards would be my top plan.”

“And what would be your top plan?”

“For the love of God, Aria. When have I lied to you in the last year? When have I withheld information from you?”

Aria’s gaze seemed to narrow and she rose to her feet, standing to eye to eye with her human inferior. Livia held tight onto her bottle, a makeshift weapon if absolutely necessary, but stood still and stared back into Aria’s eyes. A moment passed, no one dared breathe, and then Aria stood back, seemingly satisfied with Livia’s conviction.

“They seemed to be headed for the recruitment drive to take on Archangel,” she said, “though I’m not sure they’re going to do exactly what the Blue Suns want. The whole Archangel thing isn’t really my issue but you’ll want to start there.”

“I’ll try not to get killed on that charge across the bridge.” Livia chuckled, though more out of nervousness than amusement. “Can’t believe Tarak thought that’d be a good idea.”

“Let’s hope Archangel is as good a shot as they keep blabbering on about. A new shift of leadership could be good.”

“Yeah, could be.” Livia chewed on her lip, leaning back on her heels. She knew she shouldn’t overstep her bounds, that the conversation was done and a job had been set, but she needed answers.

How did Cerberus know she was here? She’d never given their operatives her real name, never told them anything that could lead back to the Alliance, never even let them see her real hair. Where had she gone wrong? Her thoughts began to race into a panic, the rum barely holding them down.

_You fucked up. You fucked it. How could you get this wrong again? Dad was right. No safety for me here. Not while I’m this stupid. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck_.

“Something else on your mind?” said Aria as she sat back down. “Or are you just wasting space and time?”

Livia closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "What did they...did they say anything about me? Any details they know?"

Aria shook her head. "Nothing definitive. They don't know what you look like, if that's what you're asking, but they know your background. Treating loonies, infiltrating systems, all the like. One of her friends - she had had an accent like yours - seemed to be insistent that you'd already left."

"They're operating on old data then," Livia replied, her voice weak as her throat grew dry. "Probably from back when Caius..." 

She left the sentence hanging, her thought unfinished. There was no point wondering where she'd gone wrong now, especially if Cerberus' data was as old as it seemed. She'd known where she'd gone wrong back then and there were countless mistakes she'd had to rectify afterward. It seemed that yet another mistake had come back to her. And she would make it right, just as she always did. 

Placing her bottle on a nearby ledge, Livia reached up and began pulling her hair free of its braids. She'd have to be crafty if she wanted to be close to the Commander and a little deceptive if she wanted to learn exactly what Cerberus wanted with her. "Does Cerena have spare outfits in the dancers' quarters?" she asked, turning back to Aria. " _Maria_ has a few things to do." 

Aria chuckled, shaking her head. "I'm sure she can find one. Try not to piss off the Commander like you did me, Livia." 

Shucking off her jacket, Livia pulled her knives from her belt. The pounding in her head seemed to ease with her hair down and without her knives, she felt disgustingly more vulnerable than usual. _Perfect_ , she thought as she shoved her things beneath the couch. _All part of the plan...I hope_. As she descended the stairs and set off toward the strippers' quarters, Livia did her best to ease the tension that seized her body. Her shoulders relaxed. Her hips swayed ever so slightly. And a smile worked its way onto her face. 

Not even the Shadow Broker could get the best information without a little deception. Livia just hoped the Commander could forgive the lies in the end. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone that came across my little story, left a comment or clicked that little kudos button. You're all adorable. Just stating outright that the rate at which I'll be getting chapters up in the next couple of weeks will dwindle a little later, as second semester will begin and I'll be swamped with a lot of work. Apologies in advance. 
> 
> Regardless, hope you all enjoyed. See you all in the next one.


	3. Old Ghosts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I wasn't scared; I was just somebody else, some stranger, and my whole life was a haunted life, the life of a ghost." - Jack Kerouac, 'On the Road'

* * *

** Chapter 2: Old Ghosts **

* * *

The cheap pistol snapped with ease in Shepard’s hands, a spark erupting from the faulty chamber. The man – or better yet, _boy_ – stared at her in bewilderment as the shattered pieces of his gun crumbled to the floor.

“Trust me, kid,” she said, holding in her anger as best she could. “You’ll thank me later.”

Shepard turned away before she could watch the boy’s reaction but it was taking every bit of her self-control not to pummel the kid into the ground. Omega was no place for him, nor anyone like him, but no matter where she looked, there were hundreds of others like him scattered throughout Afterlife. Danger seemed to attract the young like flies to honey and Omega was the biggest honeytrap of them all. Shepard tried not to think about how many of the children before her would die on the station, how many would be trapped in gangs and lives they'd never wanted. With a mission still to complete, she knew there were more important things to think about but her distracted state of mind seemed to cling to the morbid and Omega was anything but cheerful. 

Too caught up in her anger, Shepard barely noticed the girl racing toward her until they had collided. Stumbling back onto her heels, the girl swore under her breath. “Shit,” she muttered. “Shit, I’m so sorry. I didn’t even see you. I’ve been so distracted all night. I—”

“Hey, hey.” Shepard put her hand on the girl’s shoulder. She swayed on her feet for a moment but managed to regain her balance as Jacob caught her arm. She giggled softly and looked up at the Commander, her green eyes sparkling under Afterlife’s glow. _Another fucking kid_ , she thought. _Just another goddamn child_. “You gonna be okay?”

The girl sighed and gave a short nod, leaning back against the bar for extra support. As she lifted her face toward the light, Shepard caught a glimpse of the jagged scar across her cheekbone. Her dark curls framed her face, almost hiding the imperfection, but as Shepard glanced down at the rest of her body, it became clear that she was beyond hiding her scars. Across her collarbone, up her forearms, along her belly - the girl was covered in them. Shepard held her breath. _She's almost as cut up as me_.

“I’m sorry,” said the girl, laughing as she spoke. “Again. I’ve been running around all night, barely watching what I'm doing. I’ll be better this time. You know. With the whole…walking thing.”

Shepard was beginning to feel more and more like a mother the longer she stood in Afterlife. A part of her wanted the distraction, to be doing anything other than looking for another crew member to hate, but with Miranda silently seething at her back, she decided to make her reprimands quick.

“Hey, what’s your name?”

The girl took a second to answer, as if she’d somehow forgotten. “My na—oh, um…Maria.”

“Maria,” Shepard repeated. “You really think this line of work is for you?”

“Well, it’s certainly not for everyone,” she replied. “It’s not so bad. Pays pretty well and…” She looked down at her body, a hand falling over a scar on her stomach. “It’s not so bad.”

Miranda stepped forward, her impatience seeping through her skin-tight outfit. “Shepard, we should really—”

The Commander held up a hand. “Archangel can wait two minutes, Miranda. Get off my ass.”

“Archangel?” Maria looked down at her hands. “The turian? I’ve been hearing a lot about him. None of the merc gangs will stay quiet about it.”

“Turian?” Shepard felt a twinge of familiarity, the same feeling she got when reading his dossier back on the Normandy. However, this time, it was harder to bury. “No one mentioned him being a turian.”

“They didn’t?” said Maria. “Funny. A lot of mercs I’ve seen had mentioned it before. The more you know, I guess.”

Shepard stepped back, her heart hammering in her chest. The mission was getting more complicated by the second. She couldn’t ignore the clues that had clawed their way to the surface - talented sharpshooter, idealistic and merciless against the unruly, _turian_. Archangel was something more now, something achingly familiar. _Only one way to find out_. 

“If you need anything,” said Shepard, swallowing against the hard lump that had formed in her throat, "I'm gonna be around Omega for a few days. Come see me if you need help."

Maria smiled with a childish grin, one that was all teeth and cheeks that bunched beneath her eyes, and gave a quick nod. “I will…Commander.”

And with that, she slipped into the buzz and hum of Afterlife. Like the old ghosts that chased Shepard through her own ship, Maria slipped away without word nor warning. She tried not to let it irk her but as she moved toward the exit, uncertainty gnawed at her gut. _Head up_ , she thought as they moved through the dull, grimy alleyways. She glanced behind her, catching a glimpse of the disapproval in Miranda’s expression, and ground her teeth together in frustration. Cerberus was always watching and she wouldn’t give the Illusive Man the satisfaction of seeing her fall.

_Head up_ , she thought again. _Nowhere to go but forward_.

* * *

Of all the things that came with recon work, Livia hated watching the most. That slow waltz behind a target, slipping in and out of cover to divert their attention, was boring at the best of times. Even the most dangerous targets seemed to forget to check their surroundings, especially if they felt their safety was assured. Their egos were always interfering with their better judgement, walking in long, confident strides with Livia right on their tail. Everyone let their guard slip when they were certain no one was watching and Livia was more than happy to exploit that confidence, so long as it made her job easier.

Commander Shepard, however, was not in the majority. Perhaps it was Omega that had put on her edge, with its dark, hidden corners and slimy characters, or the looming Cerberus bodyguards at her back but the Commander was ever vigilante in inspecting her surroundings.

Keeping her head low, Livia sat patiently by the bridge as Cathka debriefed the trio. The crack of a sniper shot rang out across the way, no doubt executing some poor chump dumb enough to agree to becoming Tarak’s personal cannon fodder. Livia looked down at her omni-tool and checked the specs on her tactical cloak for the seventh time. She wasn’t eager to join the bodies that already littered the bridge. Her gear couldn’t fault her today, not if she wanted to survive the run inside Archangel's base. 

_Inside._ Livia shook her head, silently laughing at herself. _This is the worst idea I’ve ever come up with_. 

The flow of people through the barricade slowed to a trickle, with fresh faces crossing the threshold every few minutes instead of every few seconds. Their eyes shone with excitement, no doubt envisioning the credits dropped into their open palms, and in a flash, their bodies dropped onto the concrete. The ground was beyond her cover was no doubt slick with blood and the smell of dead flesh had begun to reach nauseating levels. Livia closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the crates that shielded her from Archangel's rifle. She could hear her mother's voice in her ear, whispering bedtime stories that were far too gruesome for most. 

" _They called it 'No Man's Land', for it was filled with the blood and guts of men who had tried to cross it_." Livia remembered how she had shivered beneath the blankets, watching her mother's hands as she pictured the lifeless faces of men in the mud. " _The trenches were hell for the men, all wet and muddy, but it was better than No Man's Land. Anything was better than drowning in mud or being curled in wire. Anything was better than trying than death_." 

_You were right, Mama_ , Livia thought as another pair of starry-eyed recruits vaulted the barricade. _Someone should've told these kids that story._ She waited for the gunshot, for the thud of their bodies hitting the ground, but movement beyond the barricade drew her attention away. The Commander’s squad had moved onto the bridge and they were not blinded to the horrors of war. In an instant, Livia's tactical cloak flickered to life and she melted into the shadows by the time Shepard passed her by.

“Doesn’t look like Archangel has much more time,” said the man to her left. “You think we’re gonna make it?”

“If he’s held out this long, he can wait a few minutes,” Shepard replied. “Alright, Jacob, you push just ahead. Miranda and I will be right on your ass. Let’s give these guys a surprise of our own.”

An explosion roared up ahead, mingled with the sharp crack of Archangel’s rifle and the barrage of merc bullets below. Livia pressed her back against the crate, ears pricked for any more conversation, but as the sounds of war roared around her, she knew her time was up. Pushing her legs into motion, Livia bolted out of cover and onto the bridge. Her tactical cloak glimmered under the light, though she tried not to think about it as she leapt over countless bodies and weaved around cover. Her adrenaline was on high, sending her thoughts into a craze, but luckily, infiltrating the base was purely mechanical. She didn’t have to think too hard to avoid making noise.

Approaching the other side of the bridge, Livia veered toward the ledge. To her right, the Commander had charged on ahead. She stood at the entrance to the base, unloading a clip into a mercenary’s back before he even realised that the gunfire was aimed his way. She moved with an intensity that had been mysteriously absent till now, a fire that drew every set of eyes her way. Livia could only guess what was driving her, though her guess was particularly well informed.

She’d collected enough data on Archangel for Aria to know the key facts – he’d arrived in Omega a few months before Livia and almost immediately started stirring up trouble. He was a turian, formerly a C-Sec Officer according to some of his suppliers, and a skilled sharpshooter among a host of other talents. His crew had accumulated over time, slowly gaining influence among the citizens of Omega, but then, in a disastrous turn, they were brutally snuffed out. All events culminated into the standoff, with Archangel holed up inside a relative fortress while the local mercenary gangs fumbled to finish him off.

And now, with Commander Shepard so desperate to pull him out of the fire, Livia could rule out almost all other candidates she’d suspected to have worn Archangel’s mantle. But only if she survived the infiltration.

Keeping her breathing as shallow as possible, Livia stepped over the dead merc’s body and followed the Commander into the base. A few lucky mercs had made it into the ground level, though they were considerably less lucky to have Shepard on their asses. Ducked behind cover, Livia followed her group through the base as silently as she could. Her thoughts didn’t slow down as she crept up the stairs, hoping rather desperately that “Miranda” didn’t have enough intuition to notice the shimmering figure behind her.

With her back pressed against cover, Livia pulled down her tactical cloak and took a moment to breathe. A quick glance around the corner revealed Shepard pacing as Miranda worked to unlock the door. Her fingers moved rapidly across her omni-tool, her pace no doubt fuelled by the Commander’s anxiety. Livia leaned back into cover, her head starting to pound as her thoughts became all too loud inside her skull.

_Keep quiet. Keep quiet. Don’t fuck this up. Keep quiet._

_Stay still. Don’t let them see you._

_Stay still. Don’t move. You can’t fuck this up._

_You won’t get a second chance. You’re breathing too hard._

_She’s weak. Nauseous. Gonna fuck it up._

_She’ll ruin it. Just like she ruined Caius._

_Always about him, isn’t she? Won’t let it go. Vengeful_

_Childish. When will she grow up? Weak, weak, WEAK._

“There,” said Miranda, cutting through voices that swirled around Livia’s head. “Let’s hope he doesn’t shoot us as soon as we go in.”

Her time was up, yet again. The tactical cloak came up and she broke out of cover, moving swiftly toward the door before it closed on her. Her heart raced but she did her best to stay calm as she settled against a wall cast in shadow. 

“Archangel?”

The turian held up a hand, his expression obscured by the helmet he wore. Shepard tensed, balled her hands into fists and rolled back her shoulders. Livia could sense her anticipation, her fear and anxiety. She seemed to be teetering on a knife’s edge, a moment away from emotional collapse, and behind her, her Cerberus crew exchanged a worried look.

Another crack of Archangel’s rifle echoed through the base. With a heavy sigh, he rose to his feet. Battle-weary and visibly exhausted, he removed his helmet and parked himself atop a crate. His blue markings curled beneath his eyes and down onto his mandibles, a visor lowered over his left eye. Livia’s breath hitched, his colony marks reminding her a little too suddenly of what she’d lost.

“Shepard…I thought you were dead.”

In an instant, the tension in Shepard’s form fizzled away. She took a step forward and her voiced wavered. “Garrus Vakarian?”

The turian smiled. “In the flesh. What’s left of it anyway.”

“What are you doing here?” Shepard exclaimed. “Omega’s a long way from C-Sec.”

“Just killing mercs. Plenty to go ‘round, especially when there’s so little red tape to tie me down. Bureaucratic crap on the Citadel just wasn’t for me in the end.”

Archangel paused, taking a moment to regard his former commander. It was as if he were trying to figure out if she were a delusion, a wild hallucination before his untimely end. “What about you?” he went on. “You’re far from dead.”

“Long story,” Shepard replied. “Although, you got me good a few times there. Tryna make sure I stay dead, Vakarian?”

The turian laughed. “You were taking your time, Shepard. Had to get you moving somehow.”

Livia sank into a crouch, slipping deeper into the shadows, and did her best to commit their names to memory _. Jacob, Miranda, Garrus, Shepard_. All wildly different people, converging on Omega for…what? Some kind of mission? A covert operation? Just some godforsaken catch-up? What was all this searching for? 

The clues were there but everyone skirted around the issue, side-stepping the one thing that Livia needed to understand. It was infuriating but as she watched Shepard and Archangel discuss tactics by the window, she couldn’t help but feel like she was intruding on an emotional moment. This wasn’t the place to discuss bigger issues – they were all to focused on getting out alive. It wasn't the intel she'd hoped for but it was the best she was going to get for now. Sensing that greater dangers were rumbling across the bridge, Livia plotted her way out of the base. The bridge may have been avenue of death but with the lower tunnels sealed off, there was no other way back. The risk of being shot on both sides was high and even with her tactical cloak, she flirted with the prospect of being discovered.

Livia smiled. _Been in worse places before_.

As Eclipse mercenaries funneled themselves over the bridge, Livia slipped back through the door and headed for the ground floor. Though no closer to understanding what Cerberus could want with her, she had a place to start looking. There was no chance in hell that she’d accept a deal from them without being prepared, not even if the Illusive Man gave her millions in return for her service. Perhaps it was her illness or just past experience but in Livia’s experience, paranoia was just a fancy word for rightful caution.

Careful to avoid the line of fire, Livia moved from the lower levels of Archangel’s base to the bridge. Though progress was slow going, she slipped from one piece of cover to the next without so much as a glance from the Eclipse members. One by one, the mercenaries fell. Livia tread carefully over their corpses, keeping her head down to evade the shots, and crept behind the final piece of cover before the barricade. She crouched low, a hand against the ground to steady her, and waited for the last of Eclipse to move beyond cover.

The flow of men continued for a while and the bodies never stopped dropping. Between Archangel and the Commander, the Eclipse mercs had little chance to breathe. Even their mechs couldn’t be salvaged, the giant hunk of lumbering metal exploding before it could do any real damage to their opponents. Livia waited patiently as the horde slowed, the fountain for willing guns quickly drying up. The last man jumped over the barricade and the final, fruitless push began.

Jaroth looked furious as he stepped onto the bridge, his wide eyes focused intently on Archangel’s form across the way. Livia had remembered the news of his best men dying by Archangel's hand but the details were fuzzy at best and mercenaries dying on Omega wasn’t new. So much information crossed her desk that it was impossible to remember it all, especially when certain data just wasn’t useful. In the back of her brain, there was something else about him that she supposed she should remember but her thoughts were too muddled and chaotic to pin down. 

_Just get off this damn bridge_ , she thought. _Why won’t this asshole get moving?_

Jaroth inched forward, his pistol aimed upward, but his caution was rewarded with a concussive shot to the chest the moment he scurried out of cover. He hit the ground hard, practically landing at Livia’s feet. He groaned and moved to stand again but Livia had had enough. De-cloaking, she pounced out of the dark and drove a knife deep into his shoulder. He cried out in pain, his pistol clattering to the ground, and wriggled under her grip but as she pulled him into cover, another knife went to his throat. With her knees pinning down his chest and free hand, she loomed over him and pressed down on the blade at his throat.

“Going somewhere, Jaroth?” she said, her thoughts soaring into a rage.

The salarian’s eyes grew wide with fear and he stuttered in reply. “Livia, I-I never…Tell Aria I didn’t mean it like that! It wasn’t even my idea. I just talked—”

“Talked to who?” Livia cocked her head to the side, curious now. “What schemes have you been cooking?”

“I had nothing to do with it!” Jaroth exclaimed, wincing as she pushed the knife further into his neck. “I swear, I’d never go against her.”

_Mutiny. Traitor. Slipped the net_

_Aria won’t like that. That’s what she forgot. Thought they could get away with it. We always find out. Better take him out._

_Kill him. Kill him. Kill him. Kill him killhimkillhimkillhimkillhimKILLHIM._

Livia held her breath. “Sorry about this.”

Dark green blood coated her fingers as she drew the knife across Jaroth’s throat. He tried to scream but an awful, gurgling sound replaced his voice. His body jolted and writhed beneath her weight but she did not move, holding him down as life faded from his eyes. She pulled her knife free of his shoulder, the blade slick with his still warm blood, and rose from the carnage to her feet.

She had to get back to Aria. Something wasn’t right among the gangs and if she found out the hard way, Livia’s head would be on the chopping block. She’d survived this long. She wouldn’t be outdone yet.

Livia stepped over the barricade and made her way back to Afterlife. Her hands were still sticky with blood, the smell of death lingered in her nose and even as an explosion rumbled in the compound far behind her, she could only find the strength to walk forward. 

* * *

Shepard couldn't help but pace the halls. It was all she could allow herself to do: walk from starboard to port over and over as her thoughts began to tumble over each other. Her gut was twisted and aching with anxiety, a headache had crept into back of her head and her hands were still covered in grime and blood. _His_ blood. _Garrus'_ blood. Her mouth was dry but she swallowed anyway, gagging on air. _He'll make it_ , she thought, placing one foot in front of the other. _He'll make it or I swear to God..._

The fight on Omega had been going so well. Eclipse had thrown themselves across the bridge, falling one by one to their barrage, and Blood Pack had disintegrated the moment that Garm fell under the weight of her biotics. It was the most normal fight she'd had weeks, if such a thing existed. She was comfortable at Garrus' side, laughing and confident that they'd get the job done. She'd almost felt like nothing had changed, even with Miranda dissecting every order she made, and she'd forgiven herself for that concession. She'd let complacency creep into her muscles and feel at ease in a warzone. And the gunship appeared, that godforsaken gunship, to shake her out of her daze. She remembered an uncanny sense of panic, a ringing in her ears and Garrus, bleeding and _dying_ at her feet. It was anger that fueled her after that, anger at the gunship, at the Blue Suns, at Jarak, at herself. She couldn't shake the feeling of guilt that overtook her as they waited for the evac, Garrus' blood covering her hands and spilling out onto the floor. 

_I did this_ , she thought as she tried to stop the bleeding. _I fucking did this_. 

Shepard tapped the door to the observation lounge and spun on her heel for another lap of the hallway. She wasn't sure how long she'd pacing but it was long enough for a crowd to form. Some of the crew had gathered at the mess table, whispering between each other as they peered through the medbay windows. Despite their best efforts to remain quiet, Shepard could hear every word.

“You think he’ll make it?”

“Not sure. He looked awful when he came in.”

“Half his face has come off. There’s no coming back from that.”

“But the Commander’s pacing like crazy. What’ll happen if he dies? You think she’ll—”

“What? Go crazy?”

“I don’t wanna find out.”

“We’ve barely even gotten started. If she’s falling apart now, what will she be like against the Collectors?”

_A failure_ , Shepard thought. _I’ll be a wasted investment, that's for sure._

In the mess hall, someone hissed at the group and they were reduced to silence. Shepard didn't have to guess who as Miranda stepped into her path and crossed her arms over her chest. She was as shrewd as ever, her gaze cutting through crowd of onlookers and dispersing them without another word. Her jaw was set in a hard line and her blue eyes glowered at Shepard’s bruised and battered form.

“Commander, you should go get dressed,” she said. Her voice was level and infuriatingly calm. “You’re not going to pass the time any quicker like this.”

“I’m fine, Miranda,” Shepard replied. “Go file your damn reports.”

“Like hell you’re fine. You’ve been walking up and down this hallway for an hour. There’s nothing you can do now. Just go back to your quarters.”

“I know I can’t do anything bu—”

“Then go clean yourself up! Take a shower. Have a drink. Shoot up the cargo bay – I don’t care! Just stop sending the crew into a panic because you can’t control your emotions.”

Shepard took pause and fought to control her breathing. She knew she should say something, shout back, reprimand her, do _anything_ that a normal CO would do. But her tongue was heavy and words escaped her. Garrus was lying on an operating table, inches away from death, and there wasn’t a thing she could do to help. She couldn’t reason with his injuries, couldn’t shoot them away or kill them before they caused irreparable harm. The problem was too far out of her hands and even worse, she was the cause. Her and her stupid, giddy happiness at finding an old friend.

Eyes downcast to the floor, Shepard’s hands hung limp at her sides. “I’ll…I’ll be in my cabin if you need me.”

She couldn’t look Miranda in the eye, couldn’t let her know that she was right. She just shuffled into the elevator and left her worries on the crew deck. _It’s better to be numb_ , she thought. _Better to pretend nothing’s wrong at all._

The water ran blue into the drain as Shepard scrubbed Garrus’ blood off her hands. Beneath her fingernails, the dried blood wouldn’t budge but she couldn’t stop herself from rubbing her skin raw. She lost track of how long she spent in the shower, hunched beneath the stream of boiling water, but it wasn’t long enough to wash away the sound of Garrus’ mouth filling with blood. The image of his face torn open, left mandible twitching in pain and his blue eyes darting around the room in search of aid – it was seared into her mind.

She wondered what might have happened if they’d delayed, gone off to find the professor first and left Garrus at the mercy of the gangs who’d sealed him in. Even contemplating what might have been made her sick, bile rising in the back of her throat. There was so much more that could’ve gone wrong, so many bad decisions, but Shepard couldn’t help feeling like she’d still somehow fucked up. Another member of her crew – another friend – was hurt, almost died, under her command.

_“You worry too much, skipper.”_

Shepard shook her head, as if Ashley were there to see her collapse. “Or maybe not enough.”

Down in the briefing room, Shepard leaned against the table to keep herself standing. Her hair was still wet and dripping on her fresh fatigues. She chewed on her lip as each second began to feel like hours, waiting for Jacob to deliver the bad news. Or at least, she presumed the news was bad as the look on Jacob’s face hardly encouraged warm feelings.

“Commander, we’ve…we’ve done all we could,” he began. The pity in his voice did little to soothe her, her hands balled into fists as she held her breath. “But he took a bad hit. The docs corrected the damage with surgical procedures and some cybernetics. He’ll have full functionality, as best we can tell, but—”

The door hissed as it opened and Shepard almost expected Miranda to reappear and scold her for her “unprofessional” manner. But despite his singed armour and a thick bandage across his burns, Garrus stood tall in the doorway wearing the slightest hint of a grin.

“Tough son of a bitch,” said Jacob, the tension in the air dispersing with his change of tone. “Didn’t think you’d be up yet.”

“Well, nobody would give me a mirror,” Garrus replied, stepping into the room. “So I presume it looks terrible.”

Shepard’s mouth was dry and her shoulders sagged with relief but she did her best to remain composed. “Hell, you were always a little ugly, Garrus. Slap on a little face-paint and no one’ll be the wiser.”

Garrus laughed but he winced at the sudden motion, holding a hand to the side of his face. “God, don’t make me laugh. My face is barely holding together as it is.”

Shepard nodded as nervous laughter spilled from her lips. “Noted. Is there anything else to report, Taylor?”

Across the table, Jacob shook his head. His body went rigid as he gave a quick salute and then turned toward the door, leaving the old crewmates behind without a word. Shepard was grateful for his lack of commentary. She was almost certain he’d seen her rapid shift in demeanor, how her hands shook with relief and her voice cracked on the verge of tears. She couldn’t handle anymore judgement today, not with Miranda breathing down her neck and the lives of her crew both past and present lingering in her mind. By the time Jacob had left the room, Shepard’s guard had well and truly dropped.

“God,” she sighed, leaning back against the table. “What a fucking day.”

“Shouldn’t it be me saying that?” said Garrus, moving to stand beside her. “I mean, not saying that taking a rocket to the face is as bad as suddenly allying with Cerberus but…”

Shepard smiled and looked down at her hands, a little too ashamed to meet his gaze. “It’s a close second. Sorry to steal your thunder, Vakarian.”

“If I nod and pretend that I understand what that means, will that make you explain what the hell we’re actually doing here? I mean, really Shepard? _Cerberus_?”

“It’s…a long and terrible story.”

Shepard crossed her arms over her chest. She knew how it all looked. She wasn’t ignorant of the experiments they’d found on desolate planets two years ago, with Thorian creepers and rachni sealed inside twisted labs. She wanted to say it was all a game, that she was playing the Illusive Man as effortlessly as he played her, but the truth wasn’t nearly as simple. In fact, the truth was just a downright mess.

Shaking her head, Shepard fumbled with her words. “They resurrected me, Garrus. They took two years and millions of credits to…to remake me. To bring me back. They pulled Joker out the Alliance, rebuilt the Normandy and gave me everything back to…to do—"

“Whatever the Illusive Man asked of you.” Garrus scoffed, though Shepard wasn’t sure if it was at her or the mess that she’d found herself in. “Cerberus sure know how make you feel obligated.”

“Yeah, it’s…a unique working situation,” Shepard replied. “But for what it’s worth, I’m glad I finally have someone I trust to watch my back as we waltz straight on into hell.”

Garrus chuckled. “Just like old times, huh?”

“Just like old times.”

The two stood in silence for a little while longer, admiring the terrible situation they’d found themselves in. To have an old crewmate back felt better than Shepard could have ever expected - the tension that had been building for days inside her melted away the longer she stood with Garrus. Her headache had begun to ease and she was breathing easier as the tight feeling in her chest gave way. Suddenly, the idea of taking on the Collectors didn’t seem nearly as daunting. She had a friend on her crew now, not just Cerberus lackeys and a bunch of dangerous recruits who’d sooner kill her than help her. The Normandy was starting to feel more like _her_ Normandy – safe, reliable, _home_.

Finally, able to look the turian in the eye, Shepard let out another sigh. “We’ve got a lot of work to do, Garrus. You sure you’re up to the task?”

“Fit for duty whenever you need me, Shepard,” he replied. “I’ll go see what I can do in the forward batteries. Surely Cerberus has screwed something up in there.”

“No doubt they have. Just take it easy though. No more rockets or gunships until further notice.”

Garrus gave a mocking salute, eliciting an eye roll from Shepard. “Aye, aye, Commander. Not a single rocket in sight.”

As he turned toward the door, Shepard felt her heart warm at the prospect of having another familiar face around the ship. As much as she appreciated Joker and Dr Chakwas, it was hard not to feel that they were outnumbered on their own ship. With one more old ghost on the Normandy, that feeling would hopefully begin to fade.

“Hey Garrus,” Shepard called out, just before the door closed behind him. He turned back toward her, his blue eyes alert and searching, and a soft, genuine smile pulled at her lips. “It’s good to have you home.”

After a pause, his mandibles flared in such a way that could only be a returning smile. “Glad to be back, Shepard. It’s been a long two years without you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologise in advance for this chapter coming slowly but the new semester has started and I'm drowning just a little bit. Needed to get my workload back on track before I turned my attention elsewhere. Luckily, I can write essays in my sleep at this point so writing anything else is a breeze. 
> 
> Just a small PSA - remember to take care of yourselves! Go outside, get a bit of fresh air, sleep a little longer if you need it, drink water, go see friends and do things you enjoy as well as working. Just thought I would remind everyone because I'm having a hard enough time reminding myself of these things. 
> 
> Hope you all enjoyed, until next time...


	4. The Worst Pain of All

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Despite your best efforts, people are going to be hurt when it's time for them to be hurt.” - Haruki Murakami, 'Norwegian Wood'

* * *

** Chapter 3: The Worst Pain of All **

* * *

The water in Omega was far from what Livia would call acceptable but never before had a shower felt so good. Jaroth’s blood had dried on her hands by the time she’d made it back to Afterlife but the wound of his betrayal stung all the same. Aria was far from pleased that her head of intelligence had missed something as crucial as dissent between the gangs but, luckily, the heavy casualties on all fronts softened the blow. Livia supposed she should have counted herself lucky too but the blossoming bruise along her jaw made her otherwise inclined.

_“My theory seems to be proving itself.” Aria’s eyes were alight with fury, the blue aura of her biotics flickering all around her. With her hand around Livia’s throat, she began to squeeze. “Don’t think you can get away this easily, Conti. Don’t forget the debt you owe me.”_

The water was cool as it slid over her shoulders and down her back, running black into the drain as it washed away the blood and grime of battle. Pressing her cheek against the cool metal of her shower wall, Livia stared down at her hands. Jaroth’s blood had sunk into the crevices of her palms and piled beneath her fingernails. It peeled off her skin under the force of the water and the longer she scrubbed, the more her thoughts drifted to home. To golden sand between her toes and bluebottle barbs along her cousins leg. To family dinners on plastic tables in the backyard and her Nona’s warm arancini melting on her tongue. To a world far beyond her reality on Omega.

Livia raised a hand to her neck, fingers searching, but found only the tender bruises from Aria’s assault. Her heart sank in her chest and her blood ran cold. _Stupid, so stupid._

_“If only you’d been worth all this.”_

Caius’ voice made her weak at the knees, though the feeling was distinctly different from back when she’d first met him. Once upon a time, she might have swooned for it. Now, it made her desperate, bitter, _furious_. Her last memory of him – his green eyes cold and unfeeling, his mandibles taut against his jaw and his hands balled into fists at his sides – crawled into her conscience like a rodent invading a home.

“ _If only you’d been worth all this.”_

His last words vibrated down her spine as she turned off the water. She did her best to forget those words but counter to her intentions, she had instead committed them to memory.

Pulling a towel around her, Livia stepped out into her shoebox of an apartment. The space was far from comfortable – the humid heat of Omega always seemed to seep though the cracks in the walls and there was barely enough room for her desk in the cramped space between her bed and the wall but it was hers. She could breathe easy within these walls, work and rest in peace while the rest of Omega chugged on around her.

However, with Grizz’s imposing, slender figure stood by her desk, her feeling of safety shifted to annoyance. “Do I want to know how long you’ve been standing there?”

“Long enough to start wondering what humans spend so long bathing for,” he replied, the gravelly tone of his voice grating against her ears. “That soft skin of yours so delicate that it needs special attention?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?”

Livia moved toward the desk, fishing a half-empty packet of cigarettes off her bed, and sat down at her terminal screen. Her thoughts turned to work, to the failed coup and Commander Shepard roaming Omega with Cerberus at her back. There wouldn’t be much rest for her today, not while Aria suspected her of trying to cut and run. She’d have to pull a miracle to regain the asari's trust, although Livia was still unsure if she even wanted the Pirate Queen’s good favour.

“What’s the news from the agents?” she said as she grabbed a cigarette from the packet. “Any more troublemakers I need to kill or maim or fatally injur—actually do you have a lighter first? That’d be so much better.”

Grizz growled but complied, pulling a lighter from his coat pocket. “I’m not your goddamn servant.”

“Yeah but you walked in on me while I was showering, so the least you could do is be chivalrous.”

“Fuck off, Conti.”

Livia chuckled and lit up quickly, blowing smoke into the turian’s face. “Alright, someone's touchy today. Just give me the details then if you're not up for cold-hearted flirting.”

Waving away the smoke, Grizz leaned against the doorframe and pulled up his omni-tool. He rattled off a few inane bits of intel, scattered figures about casualties from the Archangel raid and weapons stockpiles going missing. He seemed about as thrilled to be delivering the news as Livia was to follow up on it all, the names, numbers and faces flickering to life on her screen. She leaned back in her chair and chain-smoked through the meeting, the data washing over her like a slow, creeping tide. The pain along her jawbone dulled through the hour and the longer she sat there with nicotine on her breath, she began to feel more and more like herself. Though, what Livia was these days still wasn’t exactly clear. The small room was filled with the thick haze of cigarette smoke by the time they had finished. Only the soft glow of Livia’s screens illuminated the space. With a heavy sigh, she reached for the last smoke in the packet.

“We’ll appear weak if Patriarch is taken down,” she mused aloud. “But we’ll appear even weaker if Blood Pack finds Aria’s guys guarding the old krogan. Quite the paradox we have for ourselves here.”

“What about outside muscle?” said Grizz, his arms folded tight across his chest. “Make it look like a random act of kindness.”

“Hm…maybe. It'll only work if we get the right person. Anyone from Omega would arouse suspicion. People around here aren't all charitable and...wait, see if you can get our illustrious Commander Shepard on the job. That might actually work.”

Grizz made a sound that sat halfway between a laugh and a cough. “You think she’ll bite?”

Livia shrugged, her fingers ghosting over the keyboard as she brought up the Commander’s Cerberus psych file. For a terrorist organisation with millions of credits at their fingertips, they were terrible at basic data encryption. “No reason why she shouldn’t. She’s always been far too concerned about the welfare of others to let someone die needlessly. Elysium, the Zhu’s Hope colony—”

“I don’t know how the old Citadel Council would feel about that statement.”

Livia flicked ash from her cigarette butt and sighed again. “She’ll bite, Grizz. Just make sure she’s compensated and it’s a done deal. I’ll deal with what’s left of Eclipse.”

“Just you?”

“Just me, wise guy. Now get back to Afterlife so I can actually get dressed.”

“Don't know why you bother. You're showing less skin right now than you do walking around on a daily basis.”

Livia snarled and snatched a stray blade off her desk, hurling it at his head. The knife whizzed by him as he turned to leave the apartment, bouncing off the opposite wall and clattering onto the ground. She cursed, first at herself and then at Grizz as he laughed and her apartment door sealed shut behind him. She slumped in her chair, taking another pull from her cigarette. Her aim was off today, though it was rarely ever 'on' to begin with. She could almost hear Drill Sergeant Turner on her shoulder, almost feel the hard slap across back of her head as she missed another shot. 

_“You’re not gonna be able to smart-talk a target to death!”_

_Sweat dripped into her eyes and her vision blurred, a throbbing ache working its way into the base of her spine. Her shoulders stung beneath the desert sun and the thin fabric of her tank top was soaked in sweat, her breathing spiraling out of control with panic. She dragged her feet through the sand and dug her knife out of the red earth where it fell._ She’s not gonna stop _, she thought._ She’ll beat me to death before I hit anything _._

_The afternoon heat had beaten her down hard but the collective gaze of her weary classmates, lined up beneath the shade, near knocked the air from her lungs. She should be used to this by now – the constant humiliation – but every year, Turner somehow got meaner and they were all left speechless at her new method of torture. Livia wondered for a moment how she managed it, her throwing arm wavering under its own weight, but that small moment was enough to send the good sergeant off into a rage._

_The sharp crack of the stockman’s whip rang out into the open air and Livia bowed under its force, the sheer pain snatching her voice off her tongue. It rippled up her back and through the tendons in her arms but she managed to stay on her feet. Swaying slightly, she straightened up as best she could._

_Drill Sergeant Turner shrieked in her ear, her voice booming across the field. “No time for shaking, Campbell! You’ve been dead seven times over now. Hit the fucking target.”_

_Livia raised the knife. The knot in her stomach tightened and she hurled the blade as hard as she could. It bounced off the target once more._

Her last cigarette crumbled into ash. The memory lingered for a moment; its tendrils curled around the edges of her conscience. It had been a while since she'd had a flashback that vivid. Phantom pain still prickled across the small of her back and the hair at the nape of her neck stood on end. The desert school was a long way behind her now, a mere footnote in her life, but it'd certainly taken its toll. The memory clung to her but as she stood from her seat and began to get dressed, it fell back into the cool depths of the past where it belonged.

" _If only you'd been worth all this._ " 

Livia grit her teeth. She’d need a few more cigarettes before the day was done. 

* * *

_Livia had always hated the Presidium but never more than when something miraculous had happened up in the Council chambers. The interns and secretaries buzzed around the embassies, whispering over coffee cups and skirting around their workloads to discuss the latest gossip. Diplomats poured out of their offices and sat drinking by vid screens, whispering in hushed tones at the bar. Not even Huerta Memorial was safe from the commotion, with patients and doctors alike congregating under vid screens like moths to a lightbulb in the night._

_“The first human Spectre,” they muttered, dazzled by the military spectacle._

_“Never thought it’d happen—“_

_“So quickly! Almost seems like they’ve—“_

_“Just barged into Council space and demanded recognition where it’s not deserved.”_

_“And all this business with Saren...”_

_“Traitor.”_

_“It can’t be right—“_

_“Fucking humans.”_

_Livia turned up the music in her ears, drowning out the world around her. She kept her eyes forward, avoiding the screens and chattering politicians, and tapped her fingers on the bar to the beat of her music. She'd hope the noise might drown out her thoughts as well but the image of Catherine laid out on a metal gurney persisted in her mind. The ice in her glass clinked as she brought whiskey to her lips. It burned as it slid down her throat but she ordered another glass all the same. A message pinged to er Omni-tool, drawing her attention for a moment._

_\----------------------_

**_First human Spectre! Great day for the Alliance!!! Speaking of, Parliament’s got another assignment for you. Get in touch with your Illuim contacts. I’ll send word of your leave to the hospital._ **

**_Love Dad_ **

_\----------------------_

_“Fuck.”_

_Her heart sank in her chest. Another mission. More time away from her clients. More wasted sessions and broken promises. More slit wrists and bodies in bathtubs for her to identify. The memory of Catherine’s steel blue eyes crept back into her mind, pale and lifeless as they stared into nothingness._ _Livia tried not to dwell on it and threw back her drink, her fingers shaking on the glass._ Day just keeps getting better and better _, she thought as she slung her bag over her shoulder._ Can't escape them, no matter where I go _._

_The walk back to her apartment was a short one from the embassies, though Livia seemed to wobble on her feet as the whiskey did its work. On warmer days, the artificial sunlight in the Presidium warmed her cheeks and the sounds of the river reminded her of home, of walking through the surf at dusk with her mother at her side. It was a pleasant reminder on better days but today, the trickling water only seemed to mock her. Instead, it brought her back into the morgue, her hands clasped together behind her back as the white sheet was pulled back off the body. She'd told herself not to look away but the gruesome sight of Catherine's end hit too close to home._

Stupid _, she thought, ripping her coat off her shoulders._ So stupid to think I could help her change _. She dropped her bag by the door and hung her coat from a hook on the wall, exhaustion seeping into her bones. There was a rustling in the kitchen, signs of someone in her home. She tensed, a hand going to the knife on her belt. The sound of ceramic smashed against her kitchen tiles echoed from down the hall and a familiar voice followed the rukus._

_“Shit, fuck, shit!”_

_Livia sighed, relieved that she wouldn't have to fend off a random intruder, and trudged down the hallway. Th_ _e smell of oregano and tomato juice wafted past her nose as she entered, kicking a shattered piece of her broken plate toward the cabinets. Her counter was littered with groceries, packets of spiral pasta and vegetables in plastic containers strewn out over the stone benchtop. Her cupboards were opened seemingly at random, as if the turian at the root of it all had forgotten where she kept her cookware, and a pot of water bubbled and boiled on her stove._

_“How many times do I have to tell you to message me before you visit?” Livia began, though the whiskey in her bloodstream was making it hard to form the words properly. “My dad would actually shoot you if he found you here. In fact, he'd shoot you and dump you on C-Sec’s door instead of the hospital. Just to make you look that much more guilty.”_

_Caius turned away from the stove, green eyes sparkling as sunlight streamed in from the lounge room window. “Like your father would come to the Citadel willingly. After what you said about him—”_

_“Just because he considers it ‘an alien cesspool’ does_ not _mean that he declines business trips to the Presidium.” Livia approached the countertop and rifled through the groceries there. “Are you…cooking? Human food?”_

_“Trying to,” he replied, looking rather unsure of himself as he spoke. “Thought we’d celebrate your kind making it into the Spectre ranks with some of your native food.”_

_“Which you can’t eat. Fantastic. What an equal celebration.”_

_“Look, I’m trying to be considerate here.”_

_“And you assume I give a damn about some uppity military brat getting a lucky commendation.”_

_Caius laughed, picking up a pasta packet. “You sound like half the turians back at C-Sec. None of them much like your kind. Now how do I…”_

_He squinted at the instructions, bringing the plastic close to his face, but Livia was quick to snatch it from his taloned fingers. “Jesus Christ, Caius, it’s fucking packet pasta. I could make it in my sleep.”_

_She tore open the plastic and dumped the contents into the pot, the yellow spirals quickly sinking to the bottom. Caius loomed over her and peered into the water, seemingly mesmerised by it all._

_“Weird,” he muttered._

_“Don’t have pasta on Palaven?”_

_Caius shook his head. “Nope. More meat than anything else. Something about a difficult atmosphere and radiation?”_

_“So very laconic.” Digging through the rest of the groceries, Livia pulled a wine bottle from the bags. Her eyes searched the label for an origin and age, an old habit her mother had instilled in her since infancy. “Italian wine? How did you even find this on the Citadel? Most aliens don’t even know Earth has nation-states, let alone request wine from those places.”_

_“I have my ways,” he replied, crossing his arms over his chest with smug smile. “And by ways, I mean using the extranet.”_

_Livia chuckled, running over her fingers over the frosted glass, and let a smile work its way across her face. The conversation was almost enough to make her forget the day she’d had. Almost enough to forget Catherine and the deep, jagged slashes that ran up her forearms. The memory almost made her gag. Feeling dizzy, she unscrewed the cap and took a swig from the bottle._

_“Woah,” said Caius, ;leaning forward to put a hand onto the small of her back. “Rough day?”_

_Livia shrugged, the sight of Catherine’s body still vivid in her mind, and took another long swig. “Rougher than that new Spectre’s, that’s for sure.”_

_Worry creased Caius’ expression and his gaze seemed to narrow as he stepped closer, his hand coming around to hug her waist. “Spirits, you smell like a distillery.”_

_“That was the goal.”_

_“What happened at the hospital? I think I’ve only seen you drink like this when—”_

_“Can we just drop it please?” Livia snapped, her knuckles going white around the bottleneck. “I’d really rather not discuss it.”_

_Caius opened his mouth to respond, no doubt hoping to coax her into talking, but one foul look silenced him on the topic for good. They turned back to the food - an odd, abbreviated version of spaghetti Bolognese - and the evening dragged on. The pasta was alright, though nothing at all like her mother’s carbonara or her Nona’s homemade fettuccini. The wine tasted familiar and comforting as she sipped it from a wine glass, legs dangling off the counter where she sat and watched Caius cook._

_She was glad to find him there in her kitchen, as much as she worried that they might be caught. Relations between humans and turians were healing but, like her father, many were still bitter about the wars of old. Friendships between turians and humans were a strain on public conscience but love? Romance? The very concept could spark another war. Regardless of the risk, she and Caius kept seeing each other behind closed doors. It wasn’t perfect but it worked and the company of someone close was a welcome distraction from reality._

_Livia’s mind, however, still lingered on the day’s events. The eerie silence of the morgue, the chill that rippled through the air, the lifeless stare of Catherine’s eyes – it stained the back of her eyelids. The sound of a crying child rang in her ears, echoing off the pristine white hospital walls._ Four years old _, her thoughts reminded her as she emptied the last of the bottle into her glass._ She left behind a four-year-old and you couldn’t do anything to stop her _._

_Livia pulled her knees to her chest and sucked in a shaking breath. Her glass was empty now and even with the warm security of Caius’ arm around her, she felt as if she might break. Catherine’s dead eyes flashed before her again and she sobbed, a dry, awful pain ricocheting through her chest._

_“Hey—shit, what’s wrong?” Caius tensed beside her, caught off guard by her cries, and pulled her closer until she was practically on his lap on the couch. “Livvy, what happened?”_

_“I-I lost—” The words were rough like sandpaper on her tongue and she gagged, her body shivering violently. “I lost someone. S-she slit her wrists in the bathtub. Her f-four-year-old g-girl found her…fucking dead and bleeding in the bathtub.”_

_Caius said nothing in reply and Livia couldn’t blame him. What could one say to something like that? She crumbled in his hands and wept into her palms. Her grief rippled through her body, tearing breath from her lungs before it boiled beneath her skin into anger. Caius moved to pull her in to his chest and comfort her but she ripped herself away and rose to her feet._

_“I told them,” she went on, rage sending her pacing about the room. “I fucking told the Alliance brass that she wasn’t fit for active duty—that she didn’t_ want _to go back to active duty! She wanted a desk job on the Citadel and injury pay and a chance to be with her girls so they could grow up with a parent who loved them but…fuck, will they ever shut up?!”_

_The news on the vid screen aired another clip of the ceremony in the tower, the newly appointed Spectre standing tall and defiant under the Council’s gaze. Her squad stood behind her, beaming, and Livia growled at the sight, picking up her empty wine glass and hurling it into a wall. Caius jumped as shattered glass exploded onto the coffee table, broken shards glistening under the light._

_“For the love of—Livvy, you need to calm do—”_

_“Why the fuck is this all they’re playing?” Livia was yelling now, shrieking as every part of her body began to vibrate with rage. “Sure, we just got a human into the fancy Council spy ring but a dedicated Alliance soldier killed herself and nobody wants to hear it? What about the children that don’t have a mother anymore because the Alliance wouldn’t let her go back to civilian life? What about the woman who lost almost everyone to batarian raiders but still found the strength to keep going for her kids? Where’s the fucking news story about her, huh?”_

_“Livia!” Caius’ hands found her arms, his hulking form looming over her as she shook, and his talons dug into the soft skin of her biceps. His features softened as he looked down at her, her messy curls framing her face and her tear-stricken cheeks growing red. “Livvy, come back to me, okay? Just look at me, okay?”_

_Her heart thundered in her chest but Livia found the will to look up, meeting his glowing green eyes. The sub-vocals in his voice soothed her racing mind and, though her hands shook, she reached up to trace to colony marks that curled beneath his eyes. His skin was rough, immovable and strong, and he leaned into her hand, a soft purr vibrating through her palm._

_Her breathing began to level out. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, “for throwing the glass and for—”_

_“Shhh, don’t worry.” His grip on her arms loosened and he slipped arm around her, pulling her closer. “I get it, Liv. I do.”_

_Livia sighed into his chest, wiping the tears from her cheeks. She doubted he truly understood, for the memory of Catherine’s corpse was still fresh in her mind, but she let her doubts go unspoken. Her day had been long enough. Risen up onto her toes, Livia pressed a line of kisses along Caius’ jaw and ran her fingers under his fringe. He smelled of gunmetal and red wine, a scent once so alien suddenly rendered familiar. He shuddered under her touch, arms tightening around her waist, before hoisting her up and letting her wrap her legs around the crooks of his hips._

_“This will do,” she whispered against his neck. “This will do just fine.”_

* * *

In Shepard’s dreams, the Normandy burned. Her hull was cracked in two by the force of the Collector beam. Her engines flickered, clinging to life, and died under the weight of its enormous burden. The fires peeled back the Alliance colours and scorched the metal beneath, her ship crumbling out in open space as she struggling to plug her leaking oxygen. In her sleep, she watched the Normandy fall apart before her eyes and she was left helpless as she frantically struggled for safety that would not come.

She woke tangled in her sheets, gulping in air as if she’d truly been spaced again. Her eyes searched the cabin for signs of danger, darting from the couch, to the display cabinet, to her glowing, blue fish tank. _Nothing. It was just a dream_.

Drenched in sweat, Shepard sat up and threw back the covers. Her hands were still shaking and she stumbled on her feet as she moved toward her desk but she was awake and out of the nightmare and that was all that really mattered. She was alive. She was safe. The Normandy was solid beneath her feet, the hum of the drive core vibrated through the floor and there was not a single fire in sight. And yet, Shepard knew she wouldn’t be getting back to sleep any time soon. Throwing on a hoodie, she made her way down to the crew deck in search of coffee. Her limbs were not yet awake enough to head down to the gym and beat her frustrations out onto a punching bag but she was conscious enough to know that sleep was no longer an option. Wandering into the deserted mess hall, Shepard sighed and started up the coffee machine.

As the smell of ground coffee wafted past her nose, she couldn’t help but think of her mother. She’d always been a coffee addict, drinking nearly eight cups a day sometimes, and Shepard could barely recall ever seeing her mother sat down at her station without a mug in hand.

_“No rest for the wicked, Kiera,”_ she used to say. “ _I’ll sleep when I’m dead and I’ve still got a few more years left in me. Grab me another?”_

Shepard smiled and then swallowed the lump that quickly formed in her throat. Her mother had no idea she was alive. She’d spent two years thinking her daughter was gone forever, lost to the geth in some random ambush. Her mother may have been military, she knew all the risks, but Shepard couldn’t help feeling like she’d somehow let her down. All those lessons in honesty, integrity and survival washed away and replaced by whatever Cerberus did to remake her. All those years on Alliance dreadnoughts and frigates, listening to the crew’s stories and idolising the woman who’d raised her, forgotten in a mere moment as Shepard was woken from the dead.

Shepard closed her eyes, listening to the sound of coffee beans grinding in the machine. _I’m sorry_ , she thought, as if her mother could hear her far off in the distant reaches of space. _I promised I wouldn’t disappoint you but_ …

A door hissed as it opened and Shepard was drawn out of her thoughts, sucking in breath. She looked down at the coffee pot, now half-full, and brushed her hair behind her ear in a vague attempt to look somewhat composed as Garrus stepped into the kitchenette.

“Glad to see I’m not the only one who can’t sleep these days,” he said, reaching for the fridge.

Shepard chuckled, pulling the pot from the machine and filling her mug. “No rest for the wicked, I guess.”

“None so far, at least.” Garrus stood straight, a sigh falling from his mouth as he leaned against the countertop. The bandage along the right side of his face was slightly askew, revealing a glimpse of the scorched flesh beneath. Shepard looked away and her guilt only grew.

There was silence between them for a while, with neither one of them entirely sure of what to say or how to say it. There was so much to talk about and yet, nothing all the same. The last time she’d seen Garrus, he’d been on his way back to C-Sec. He’d been reluctant to leave the Normandy, hesitant to go back to the world of bureaucracy and regulations that awaited him on the Citadel.

_“It’s not like we’re going anywhere special, Garrus,”_ she’d said to him. _“Just hunting geth. If you end up hating it on the Citadel again, you can come back. You’re always welcome on the Normandy. You know that, right?”_

She remembered how he’d laughed without humour, indecision woven into the slump in his shoulders and the tension in his jaw. “ _I know. Just not sure what’s up or down anymore. All this Reaper business…”_

_“At least you know when you come back, it’ll never be boring.”_

_“_ When _I come back?”_

_“Okay, I may be projecting a little but you get my point.”_

Her memories were clear but her reality was far from it. She’d left him on the Citadel and found him again, two years later, cornered like prey on Omega. She’d died and everything had changed. Reality had warped, shifted at its core, and Shepard was drowning as she struggled to keep her head above water, making sense of it as she went. It had worked for a little while. It had gotten her out of that Cerberus lab and onto Omega but now the two of them were stuck, two years between them, and Shepard had no idea how to close the distance. She sipped on her coffee, searing hot and bitter on her tongue. She opened her mouth to speak but struggled to find words that were anything more than clumsy. The silence between them persisted for a moment longer, resilient and defiant against any attempts to stifle it, before Garrus let out another sigh.

“You’d think it’d be easy to go back to the way it was before,” he said. “With Saren and Sovereign. I mean, you look…almost the same.”

Shepard raised a hand to her cheek, running her fingers over the ridges of her scars. “Yeah…wish I could say the same for everything else around here.”

“Feeling nostalgic?”

“Not really, I just…” Fighting a battle in her own head, Shepard finally met Garrus’ gaze. His eyes were steel blue and piercing, just how she remembered them. “I’m just tryna pick up the pieces. It feels like no time has passed at all but—”

“You died.”

Silence engulfed them once again but this time, Shepard had no excuse to look away. Garrus stared back at her with all the sadness and grief of two years in his eyes, anger and regret twinged with the bittersweet sting of relief at seeing her just one more time. “Garrus, I…”

The words went stale in her mouth and she shook her head, trying again. “I keep waking up thinking that time has barely stopped. I’m still here, on the Normandy, chasing these things much bigger than myself but I’m surrounded by strangers and it’s cold and dark and I don’t know who I can trust. I’m stuck in a war I can’t possibly win; I’ve lost allies I never knew I could lose and I’m confused beyond words because I can’t understand it. The universe has barely moved in my head but it kept going without me and I felt so alone. And then I find the friends that I thought I lost…only find out they’ve become strangers too.”

Her throat ached when she was done but for a moment, Shepard swore a certain weight was pulled off her shoulders. It felt good to finally vocalise the chaos in her head but saying it all aloud only made it more real. Garrus shook his head, mandibles taut against his jaw, and leaned back against the countertop with his arms crossed over his chest.

“Sorry,” he said. “It’s just hard to come to terms with everything. Between Omega and you, I…it’s been a rough two years.”

“What happened, Garrus?” she asked. “I left you on the Citadel, not on fucking Omega.”

He chuckled, looking down at his feet. “Good to know your memory’s still intact. Was beginning to think you might be a clone.”

“I think it would have been much cheaper for the Illusive Man if they did that but no, as far as I know, I am me…or just a high tech VI that _thinks_ it’s Commander Shepard.”

“Now that’d be unfortunate. I’m not sure a VI could beat me at Skyllian Five.”

Shepard laughed, for the first time in a long time, and the tension in her shoulders began to ease. “You really missed getting your ass handed to you?”

He shrugged. “Only a little. It was better than losing to Wrex and then being left wondering how the hell I got outsmarted by a krogan.”

“Fair point.” Shepard took a sip of her coffee but scrunched up her nose, a little disgusted by how quickly her beverage had grown cold. “But this doesn’t explain how you got to Omega.”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it. I’m stalling. At least let me sit down for this, especially considering I’ll be devastatingly sober while telling this story.”

Shepard nodded and quickly refilled her mug before she moved toward the mess table. She sat with her legs crossed, a draft along the ship floor prickling her bare legs, and held the mug close to her chest. As she raised it to her lips again, Garrus shot her a strange look.

“Never understood humans liking coffee,” he said. “It seems like you’re just happily drinking dirt for a tiny adrenaline boost.”

“You’re still stalling, Vakarian,” Shepard replied, placing her cup on the table.

“I know, I’m just…Omega isn’t somewhere I enjoy going back to, you know? Not just physically but…”

_The hiss of oxygen escaping from her suit._

_Desperate tears running down her cheeks._

_The deafening silence of open space_.

“Yeah,” Shepard said, doing her best to ignore the chill that raced down her spine. “Yeah, I think I get what you mean.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No bottle of wine to edit this one but just a whole lot of pain because uni is back in full force. This is very much a welcome reprieve, however, and I'm trying to get as much sleep as any exhausted university student can. 
> 
> Hope you're all well and happy, though if you're not it's okay. The days will get better and I'm always here for a chat. Have to use my psychology knowledge for something, after all. Thank you to those that have commented and hit the kudos button, it's much appreciated. 
> 
> Now if you'll all excuse me, I need to get some sleep. I have a quiz in approximately six hours. Until next time xxx


	5. Monstrous Beings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Nothing is so painful to the human mind as a great and sudden change." - 'Frankenstein', Mary Shelley

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No, I haven't forgotten about this. Uni was just determined to kill me.

* * *

** Chapter 4: Monstrous Beings **

* * *

A dull ache had settled along Shepard’s jawline by the time they got the professor back onto the Normandy. Her armour felt sticky somehow, diseased and corrupted by whatever plague had run through the lower levels of Omega. It was a feeling that had sunken into her pores, burrowed beneath her skin. A shower hadn’t quite been enough, nor clean clothes or a cup of coffee. Her discomfort followed her into the briefing room, where Shepard tried her best to conceal the rigidness of her movements.

She hadn’t quite known what to expect back on Omega, bar from a salarian with the expertise to get them through the Collector swarms, but her imagination hadn’t had the capacity to dream up a more eccentric character. He spoke in fractured sentences, his words practically tripping over one another, and his thoughts seemed no less feverish. His gaze narrowed as Jacob presented the details on the Collector abductions, his wide eyes glazing over as he was lost to contemplation.

Almost as soon as Jacob was done, the gears in his head began to grind and Mordin rattled off theories on Seeker swarm countermeasures quicker than Shepard could comprehend him. His eyes darted from side to side, from one possibility to the next, and his mouth moved even quicker.

“Gas, maybe? No. Spreads too slow. Airborne virus? No. Slower than gas. Drugged water suppl—”

“You don’t have to sit there and guess, Professor,” Shepard interrupted, digging her fingers into her temples. “We’ve collected samples from one of the colonies, more than enough for you to analyse and figure out exactly how the Collectors are doing this.”

The salarian’s face lit up, his concentration melting into excitement. “Ah excellent. Guesswork, not ideal. Good of you to think ahead. Will analyse the samples.”

The professor set to work not long after their meeting, busying himself amongst test tubes, data screens and vast figures. Though some deeper part of her suspected a little madness within him, Shepard couldn’t deny his work ethic. He worked quickly and they needed haste as well as accuracy. The Collectors certainly weren’t going to wait for them to catch up.

Still, Shepard couldn’t help but make comparisons to the mad scientists in her mother’s books and old black-and-white vids. Though Mordin was far from the bumbling ‘ _Victor Frankenstein_ ’ type, his cold, unwavering belief in his research gave her pause. She remembered back to when she was a teenager, feeling the cracks along the paperback’s spine, the golden letters embossed across the cover and how the pages were yellowing under the burden of age. She remembered how she’d frowned and scrunched up her nose at the vid’s interpretation, arms crossed tight over her chest as her mother laughed at her annoyance.

_“It makes it seem like the monster was bad from the beginning!”_ she’d cried. “ _That it was just a fault of the brain Frankenstein chose. It completely absolves Victor of any goddamn responsibility.”_

_“Isn’t that what we all do though, Kiera?”_ said her mother. _“Refocus the lens and shift the blame so that we might avoid guilt?”_

_“Not for a movie! Especially when the book clearly implies that—”_

_“The book can clearly state something but whether or not the reader takes that into account is what truly matters. Authorial intent can only go so far.”_

There was a pause, a gap in Shepard’s memory, but she could recall the monologue that followed. How her mother’s hands gesticulated wildly, the coffee in her mug sloshing from side to side, and how her voice had lowered to a whisper, as if they were sharing some great secret of the universe.

_“Think of the genophage,”_ she’d begun _. “From the perspective of the salarians, they were morally correct in ‘uplifting’ the krogan and subsequently putting them down again when they caused a ruckus. But from the krogan perspective – the monster’s perspective – they were used and thrown aside like pawns on a chess board. They may not be the most intelligent of creatures but they’re alive and conscious and they can comprehend when they’ve been manipulated. Now out of all of this, whose side do we pay most attention to?”_

Shepard looked down at the book in her lap, chewing on the inside of her cheek. _“Victor’s side. We listen to the intellectual side.”_

She remembered how her mother nodded, a satisfied smile working its way onto her lips, and she brought the mug up to her mouth. _“And why is that?”_

“ _Because we find it easier to accept the humanity of those who can articulate it in ways we understand.”_

_“No,”_ her mother replied, _“it’s because we find it easier to accept the humanity of those who_ think _exactly like we do_.”

The memory was old and fractured but Shepard had maintained it somehow, through life, death and construction. Some people were not easily comprehended, her mother had taught her, but that did not make them any less worthy of being heard. As she passed through the lab, Shepard wondered if the salarian doctor could say the same about the krogan. Or perhaps her literary comparisons were more fitting than she’d realised.

Slipping into the elevator, Shepard pulled her thoughts back into focus. One final dossier held them back in Omega and it was shaping up to be the most difficult recruitment to fill. Rooting a spy out of her hiding place would take more than shooting up gang members and pleading for the sake of missing colonists. Shepard needed someone who knew the area, the occupants and whatever obscure, little hidey-hole Conti could’ve nestled into. Otherwise, she’d be fumbling around in the dark and more colonists would pay the price.

The elevator doors slid open. Shepard grit her teeth. _Garrus, I hope you can forgive me for this_.

The gun battery was quieter than the rest of the ship. The low hum of the drive core vibrated through the floor, accompanied by the drone of the engines along the steel walls. Garrus stood with his back to her, his fingers ghosting over the keyboard. He was consumed in thought, barely acknowledging her as she moved across the room and leaned back against his workbench.

“So,” she said, “calibrations?”

“Don’t mock me, Shepard,” he replied, though there was laughter in his voice. “These are some very _serious_ calibrations I’m working on here.”

“Remind me to get you a thesaurus some time so you can use literally any other word the next time I come in here to talk to you.”

“I’ve only been back for two days.”

“And yet, in that time, you’ve _still_ managed to make me hate that word.”

Garrus scoffed, stepping away from the console. He looked a little better today, with more vibrance in his eyes, but he continued to wear his grief along the hard line of his shoulders. “Humans and their hair-trigger boredom.”

“Not sure that’s a thing but thanks regardless.” Crossing her arms over her chest, Shepard looked down at her feet. “Listen…I need to ask something of you. Something—”

“On Omega.”

Garrus sighed and his mandibles were pulled in, tight against his jaw. Rage cast a shadow over his angular features. He flexed his talons, sharp and deadly at his fingertips, and his blue eyes seemed to glaze over as he was swept up in himself.

A wave of unease threatened to swallow Shepard whole. She’d never seen him quite like this; bitter, angry and consumed by guilt. He’d always upheld a startling mixture of idealism and brutality, his turian sense of duty overriding any regard for the kind of regulations C-Sec maintained. Part of her had always admired that part of him and even envied his certainty in his convictions but now, Shepard worried that it might suffocate him. Turn him into something he didn’t truly want to be.

“It’s about another recruit,” she replied, trying her best to ignore how contempt seemed to radiate off the turian’s body. “A former Alliance insurgent named Livia Conti.”

Garrus was silent for a moment, caught up in his thoughts, and then shook his head. “Gonna need more information than a name, Shepard. Omega’s a big place.”

“Don’t have much of a physical description for you. Whoever put the dossiers together wasn’t big on details but she’s supposedly a former psychologist. Has training in hand-to-hand combat and is, quote, ‘ _notoriously slippery’_.”

“Fantastic,” he replied. “So, we’re looking for a ghost, essentially?”

“Seems like it.” Shepard rolled her eyes and took a seat at the workbench, exhaustion weighing her down. “Fuck, we’re never gonna find this girl.”

“Never knew you to be such a defeatist.”

“I know. Shocking. It’s almost like death kicks the absolute shit out of you. Who’d have thought that’d be the case?”

Garrus laughed, though sounded more like a dry cough, and moved toward the workbench, sitting down beside her. Shepard could never quite get used to the sight of his wounds, the marred flesh poking out from beneath his bandages, and she swore she could still smell that awful mixture of fire, gunpowder and blood on his armour. She reached up and brushed her fingertips along the fracture in his cowl, the jagged points brushing soot onto her skin.

“Jesus Christ, Garrus, you ever gonna repair this?” she said, brushing the debris onto her fatigues. “It’s almost as if you want the reminder.”

“Sure, the constant ache along one side of my face is child’s play compared to my battered armour,” he replied. “Damn that brittle armour. Really just ruining my day.”

“Stow it, Vakarian.” Shepard took another glance at his bandages, a hint of blue staining the edges. “Does it…are you in pain?”

“Only…most of the time.”

“You’ve got me worried here, Garrus.”

“Don’t be. It’s just when I have to clean beneath these bandages, it’s another whole world of pain.”

Shepard shook her head, holding back a smile. “Thought you’d be used to that by now.”

“It’s been two years, Shepard. Forgive me for being a little behind on the whole ‘ _nearly-dying-every-mission_ ’ thing we had going on.”

She laughed, though the memory of better days made her chest ache. Once more, the reality of two whole years in the dark pulled her down. It was getting easier to comprehend, easier to connect the old world with the one she’d found herself in, but reminders of the old days only seemed to hinder her meagre progress.

She thought of Tali back on Freedom’s Progress, commanding her own squad and carrying out orders. She wasn’t quite unrecognisable, for her voice, the suit and the relative ease with which mechanical theory slid off her tongue had barely changed at all. But she held herself differently then, an aura of authority rippling off her in waves. When she’d barged into Veetor’s safehouse and demanded they turn him over to the Fleet, Shepard could hardly connect her with the jittery young girl who’d hidden herself away in the Normandy’s drive core.

Then Garrus came charging back into the fray, bruised and battered and near crippled by the burden of command, but his voice and his sarcasm sounded just the same as always. She wondered if the rest of the crew had changed too – had Liara lost that innocent spark in her eye? Had Wrex tempered his disgust with the ways of people? Had Kaiden…

_“I swear to God, if anything happens to you…”_

Kaiden’s voice echoed out from within the darkness of the gun battery. A shiver crawled down her spine and her breathing hitched, a unique kind of pain forming like a tumour under her ribs. Of all the memories she couldn’t face, he was the one she’d keep locked away for as long as she could. But he followed her now, those final words in the darkness of her old cabin causing a rift in her heart.

_Just your imagination_ , she thought, looking away from the battery. _It’s just your imagination playing cruel, cruel tricks on you_.

“You alright, Shepard?”

Keeping her eyes down, she shook her head. “No…but we don’t have time for it.”

“We could always make time. Don’t know about cards with Cerberus personnel but we could…” Garrus searched for the right word, his blue eyes darting about the room as if in pursuit of it, but with a laugh, he admitted defeat. “Spirits, we’re not very good at this, are we?”

“Undoubtably.” Shepard turned to the weapon’s bench, her fingers ghosting over the barrel of Garrus’ disassembled Mantis rifle. “I hope we can get better. Maybe even get a good night’s sleep for once.”

“Hah,” Garrus scoffed. “We’ll have better luck finding this damn spy.”

“Yeah…but a girl can dream.”

There was silence between them for a moment, the hum of the battery weaving between them. Shepard could feel her eyelids drooping and her bones grew weary, fingers tapping on the gritty surface of the gun barrel. How many times, she wondered, had this rifle saved her life? It had seen better days, for there were nicks around the bolt where thousands of thermal clips had been forced from the chamber and the trigger was worn down at the guard. But it was strong and reliable and it hadn’t let them down yet.

Shepard smiled _. Hasn’t let_ me _down_. She leaned her head against Garrus’ arm. “I’m sorry to have to bring you back to Omega. I wish there was another way.”

Garrus cleared his throat and shifted about, careful not to disturb her as he inched closer. “Don’t think too much of it. We have a job to do. We’ll get it done and then get the fuck away. Easy…I think.”

_“It was my own damn fault.”_ Shepard closed her eyes, the memory of Garrus’ face as he detailed out the destruction of his team drifting into view. “ _Everyone except me is dead because of Sidonis. Because I didn’t see it coming._ ”

There was a coldness in his eyes then that didn’t match the warmth she’d come to know in him, the kind that only his brittle self-control could maintain for now. She still couldn’t figure out if it was grief or anger that fuelled him now but nevertheless, it terrified her. What would he do to the man that destroyed his team? Execution seemed too polite for Garrus and even murder was too nice a term.

Shepard shivered, her teeth ground together and she tried not to think any more on the subject. _He’ll be alright_ , she thought. _He has to be_.

“Easy,” she repeated, lifting her head off his shoulder. “I hope it’ll be easy too.”

* * *

_The walls of her mother’s new executive cabin were a deep, Alliance-approved blue and the sharp scent of fresh paint lingered on the air, bitter and nauseating. The lights were dimmed to suit the encroaching night cycle, with odd shadows crawling up the wall and the commotion of dinnertime passing through the walls from the mess hall. The neat order of the furniture was a stark contrast to the chaos of her mother’s belongings strewn across the open space. Footlockers lay opened and gutted on the bedroom floor, with books stacked up on the nightstand and her mother’s dress blues thrown across the bedsheets._

_Kiera yawned and slumped down in her chair. Her shoulders ached from heaving her things across the crew deck and there were blisters forming on her palms, the sharp edges of her crates digging into her hands. It’d taken only an hour to unload all their things but, in her mind, it had felt like a year had passed. A certain heaviness had overcome her, a great weight curled in the pit of her stomach, and only when Kiera had stopped moving had it made itself explicitly known._

_She supposed it was easier to move in than out. On the new ship, there were no insubordinate crewmembers or resentful captains sneering at her mother as she loaded her things into the shuttle. No thinly veiled anger, bitter goodbyes or cold shoulders. Just another ship filled with faces she didn’t know and didn’t care to indulge._

_She could hardly blame the old crew for their indignation; they’d spent almost ten years on that cruiser. The crew were a tight-knit bunch. They’d as much raised Kiera as her mother had. They’d spent Christmases huddled in the rec room when the Alliance hadn’t authorised leave and remembered each other’s birthdays, even when the date and year became unclear. Many of them were rough and unyielding – Marines and engineers and tech experts – but they were no less family than her flesh and blood. And so, her mother’s sudden reassignment had felt more like a betrayal than a rebalancing of power._

_Kiera shivered as she remembered Hardgrave’s final words to them, standing in the shuttle bar with his scarred arms rigid at his side. “_ You could’ve just passed it along,” _he’d said_. “Made up some excuse, let someone else get the chance but you didn’t. You couldn’t resist.”

_His voice had always been coarse and gravelly, much like his abrasive exterior, but in that moment, Kiera could’ve sworn that he’d wavered on the point of tears. She wished she’d said something, said_ anything _to the rest of the crew, but the transition had been too sudden and none of them were truly willing to hear their goodbyes. Kiera couldn’t really blame them. In truth, she was just as angry._

_The bathroom door slid open, steam spilling out into the bedroom. Her mother materialised out of the steam, a towel wrapped around her and her auburn hair running loose over her shoulders. “Making some stellar progress on unpacking, I see?”_

_Kiera rolled her eyes, putting her feet up on the desk. “I was figuring out how to organise the bookcase.”_

_“Mm, we’ve never had this much space before, huh?” She surveyed the shelves, a quick once over of their new storage, and then scooped up her uniform off the bed. “Alphabetical or by genre?”_

_“You only read the classics, Mom.”_

_“Hey, hey. There are sub-genres within that category that we can work with.” Picking up a thick paperback off the bed, she held it up to Kiera. “Now the real question is whether or not we finally burn ‘Ulysses’ or…throw it out the airlock.”_

_“Mom…”_

_“What? I’m only joking. Well, for the most par—”_

_“Why the fuck are we acting like nothing has changed?”_

_Defeated, her mother dropped the book atop the stack on her bedside table. “We’re back to this again, huh?”_

_Kiera’s feet slid off the desk and thumped against the floor. Her cheeks grew warm, her fingers grew number and she felt her frustration bubble to the surface, roiling just beneath her skin. “Of course, we’re back to it, Mom. We just fucking up and left the one ship where people actually cared about us, people who fought for u—”_

_“That was not an invitation, Kiera.” Her mother’s voice grew rigid and alert, a warning of worse to come. She turned away and rifled through her near empty closet, shaking her head. “We left because we were told to. There’s no questions and no answers. That’s just military life.”_

_“No, it’s not. You’ve turned down jobs before. You could’ve turned down this one.”_

_Her mother scoffed, throwing a t-shirt over her head. “You sound like Hardgrave.”_

_“He had a point.”_

_“That was not a compliment, my dear.”_

_Kiera shook her head and bit back tears but the weight of exhaustion had ripped her apart at the seams. A sob shuddered through her chest. Her throat was raw and her hands shook, though she tried her best to hide it as she crossed her arms over her chest. She closed her eyes, hoping for some reprieve from the unfamiliar surroundings, but Eleanor came to greet her in the darkness._

_Like Hardgrave, her last words seemed branded into memory. Her hair was woven into two braids, her blonde roots melting into purple at the tips, and the back of her shirt was stained with mauve and auburn tones. Those remnants of hours spent in her mother’s old bathroom, cheap dyes and peroxide bottles lined up along the sink, had dug hooks into Kiera’s heart. The hooks had tugged her forward, her fingers reaching out for the smooth expanse of Eleanor’s skin, but the moment had passed and fate had shut her out._

“I suppose we’ll write,” _Eleanor had said. The hard set of her shoulders kept Kiera out and, with her back to her, she rested her chin in the heel of her palm._ “Not sure if you’ll have time. If not, don’t bother.”

_Though far away from that moment, Kiera could still feel the whiplash from her words. Two days apart and her heart was barely beating without Eleanor at her side._ Stupid _, she thought as she coughed out another ragged sob._ So stupid to dream _._

_Gently, her mother wiped the tears from her cheeks. She knelt down beside her and rested her head on her shoulder, an arm sliding around her waist to secure her in an embrace. Part of Kiera wanted to pull away, continue fighting, but her wounds were too fresh and she feared she couldn’t hold her own weight if she stood._

_“I hate it too,” her mother whispered. “Leaving was hard but I had my reasons. I know you know that.”_

_Kiera said nothing in reply. Her words were all spent up. She leaned into her mother’s chest and pressed her cheek against her damp hair._

_“I’m sorry to make you go,” she went on. “Did you talk to Ellie before you left?”_

_She closed her eyes, hoping to see her friend just one last time, – her soft brown eyes, a smattering of freckles across her pale cheeks, her crooked grin – but much like her words, the memory was gone._

_“No.” Her breathing hitched and her heart gave way. “No, I didn’t.”_

* * *

The batarian at the mercenary’s feet lolled to one side and heaved on empty air, a hefty blow to his gut knocking the wind from his lungs. The mercenary – tall, gruff and adorned in yellow, makeshift armour – rolled his eyes and jammed his boot into the downed man’s chest. Shepard nearly winced… _nearly._

The bounty hunter’s dossier had mentioned something about ruthlessness, though the details were still fuzzy in her head. She’d only had a moment to look over the document, her eyes skimming through the words, and there wasn’t much else she’d remembered. The Illusive Man had only forwarded the mercenary’s file as they were gearing up to leave but another man was just another weapon to use against the Collectors. Shepard could count that as a blessing, so long as she didn’t pay too much attention to his methods. She suspected that might be the case for most of her new “team” or whatever odd amalgamation of characters she was assembling could pass for.

A sharp crack rippled through the air as the mercenary pummelled the batarian even further into the ground, blood dribbling from his mouth. Miranda pursed her lips and her brows knitted into a frown, her lovely features quickly crumpling into disapproval. She looked on for a moment, standing idle as the batarian pressed his forehead against the ground in defeat, and then turned away. Shepard never suspected she might be turned off by violence, although perhaps that wasn’t it. Perhaps it was the unfairness of it, being caught and caged like an animal.

“Well,” she sighed, her shoulders sagging, “at least we know he’s good at his job.”

“You think he’ll still take commissions while on the Normandy?” said Garrus, arms folded across his chest as he watched the brutality unfold. “Could use that right hook against Sidonis.”

“Not funny, Vakarian,” Shepard replied.

“Not a joke.”

“How is it that we’re only ten minutes on the ground and you’re already worrying me?”

“I’m only mildly sadistic.”

“I think the term is ‘psychopathic’,” said Miranda.

The batarian looked up as the group approached, his eyes gleaming with desperation. He choked on his words and coughed through his sentence, his body shaking with pain.

“You’ve got to help me,” he pleaded, swaying slightly. “I didn’t—”

The mercenary kicked him again, harder this time as the batarian was driven back against the wall. “No one said you could talk, jackass.”

“Zaeed Massani?” The words tripped out of Shepard’s mouth, racing to catch the mercenary before he broke his captive in half.

“Yeah, that’s me,” he replied, turning on his heel. “You must be Commander Shepard. I hear we have a galaxy to save.”

Shepard nodded, though trying her best not to gape at his mismatched, faded blue eye and the deep, entrenched scars that ran along his cheekbone. His voice was deep and guttural, the sound of it igniting a brief flicker of memory. _“You could’ve just passed it along.”_ Shepard frowned, trying to place it, but the memory dispersed as quick as it came.

“How much do you know?” she asked. “I’d like to assume you’ve been briefed but—”

“Cerberus ain’t the most reliable bunch?” Massani shook his head. “I know enough. Collectors, Omega 4 relay, a fuckin’ suicide mission with a bloody ridiculous paycheck – what else is there to know?”

“Well, there’s the possibility of Reapers,” Garrus interjected, “but, with Shepard, that’s practically a given.”

Shepard rolled her eyes. She glanced down at the batarian, who’d since managed to push himself up onto his hands, and jerked her chin in his direction. “Who’s your friend?”

“That’s a loose fuckin’ term,” replied the mercenary. “Batarian delinquent. Managed to piss off someone rich enough to want him alive and God knows what for. Chased him across four systems but people like him aren’t the smartest. They always come back to Omega.”

“Convenient for you but he’s not coming on the ship, right? I was told we’d only have pick up one man.”

“Don’t get your panties in a twist, Commander. I’ll turn him in for the bounty after this and then I’m all yours. No need for a fuss.”

“Good,” said Shepard, holding out her hand. “Welcome aboard then, Zaeed. We’ve got a hell of a lot to do.”

Massani scoffed but shook her hand. His grip was softer than she expected, almost casual. As if he couldn’t be bothered with petty shows of force. “So they tell me.”

“That work will have to start now, I’m afraid,” Shepard went on, pulling up the infiltrator’s dossier. “We’ve got one more recruit to pick up on Omega. A girl named Livia Conti.”

“The fuckin’ spy?”

Shepard raised an eyebrow, though it took all her self-control not to smile. “You know her?”

“Yeah, I know her.” Massani drew his pistol and there was a sharp click as the safety came off and he looked down at his bounty. “Slippery bitch, that one. Four-foot nothing and yet, I saw her once fight her way through ten batarians in a barfight. Never seen so much fuckin’ blood. Aria’s smart to have her on a leash.”

“She works for Aria?” Shepard crossed her arms over her chest. “Aria said she didn’t know anything about her.”

Massani laughed, leaning down and grabbing his captive by the arm. “Of course, she would. Can’t have outsiders stealing her own pet spy.”

_Should’ve fucking known_. Shepard grit her teeth and her fingers curled into fists, a deep-seated frustration broiling inside her. She knew it was irrational, that anger trapped beneath the surface, but she’d been working with nothing for far too long already. Every hinderance cost them dearly and Shepard wasn’t just going to waste what little time they had left.

“Could you help us find her?” she asked. “You know what she looks like, at the very least. Where she might be, who she’ll talk with, what covers she might use. That’s a whole lot more than what we’re working with right now.”

“Didn’t realise commanders were in the business of asking nicely.”

Shepard scowled and the urge to hit something grew inside her.

“Alright, alright,” Massani relented. “Was just fuckin’ around. Meet me in Afterlife in fifteen minutes. Try not to get swept up in the crowds – too many fucking people around in there.”

There were, indeed, too many fucking people jammed within Afterlife’s walls. Shepard could feel herself being squeezed in, sweat building inside her armour, and the crowd seemed to pull them in, closer and closer to the club’s pulsating centre. The bar was packed, with men lined up around the benchtops and strippers perched atop them with drinks in hand. The music was beyond deafening, as the beat hammered through floor and slammed against her eardrums.

A drunk patron stumbled into her, one among dozens since they’d fought their way into the crowd. She shoved him hard and he veered into another person before being swallowed up in the dancing and the drinking and the mayhem. Her head began to pound, pain snaking its way between her temples, and she swore she could hear someone call out her name but she couldn’t figure out where from.

A ghost in the crowd snatched her wrist. Shepard whirled around to clock her assailant in the jaw but her fist stopped mid-air as a familiar pair of blue eyes stared her down. Moving forward, Garrus ducked down to reach her ear.

“All humans,” he yelled, though his voice was barely whisper over the music. “I’m only seeing humans around tonight.”

“Glad you could notice,” Shepard yelled back. “I was too busy being thrown around like a goddamn ragdoll.”

“You humans do have a combative way of dancing.”

“Not sure I’d call it dancing anymore.”

With Garrus at her back, Shepard pushed forward and inched closer to the centre of the club. She searched the crowd for Miranda, hoping to pick out her pristine white bodysuit among the grit and dirt of the masses. No such luck was offered to her.

“Commander Shepard!”

Her name pierced through the noise again, louder now and coming from the bar. Shepard craned her neck to peek over the crowds and a tussle of dark curls atop the bar came into view. The girl knelt on the benchtop, the scar on her cheek almost glowing under the strobe lights, and she reached over the crowds to grasp Shepard’s hand.

“Maria,” Shepard exclaimed as she slammed into the bar, the sheer force of the crowd throwing her off balance. “Still around, huh?”

Maria held her by the shoulders and giggled, sitting back on her heels. “Can’t miss the festivities. There’re too many people, too much work to do, too much dancing, a lot of drinking and—hey! You didn’t tell me you had a turian friend!”

Garrus slipped in beside her and his armour clanked against the bar. “Made friends already, Shepard?”

“You could say that,” she replied, looking back to Maria. “What the hell’s going on tonight?”

“A human night, of sorts,” she answered, waving her cigarette as she spoke. “They play music and sell drinks from Earth. Draws in a fairly big part of the human population on Omega. Everyone else hates it but they make it work. Something about tryna keep the masses entertained or just tryna make money. All I really know is that pay goes up for the human girls and the asari dancers get a break for once.”

She paused for a moment, bringing her cigarette to her lips, and her eyes sparkled under the dazzling lights but the green in her irises was submerged in her pupils. _High out of her mind_ , Shepard thought, though she couldn’t quite tell what had sent the girl into mania. Red sand came quickly to mind but something about the way her words burst from her mouth and the glistening shine in her gaze made Shepard think otherwise.

She put a hand on the girl’s knee, holding her steady, and Maria laughed again, smoke pouring from her lips. She swayed from side to side, wearing a giddy, dazed smile. She reached out to Shepard, caught a lock of her hair between her fingers and swirled the strands together. Garrus glanced at her, suspicion woven into the sharp tautness of his features, but Shepard held up a hand.

Maria leaned in closer. The scent of rosewater and tobacco filled Shepard’s nose. “Such a pretty colour,” she mused, letting the hair fall back into place. “Short hair suits you, Commander. Even if it’s an Alliance issue haircut.”

Shepard furrowed her brow. “Seen many military haircuts yourself?”

Balancing her forearms on the other woman’s shoulders, Maria pulled her flush against her chest. She pressed her lips to the Commander’s ear and the music dipped, a sudden wash of quiet colouring the club. Shepard stood very still; her gaze fixed on another scar just above Maria’s collarbone. A tattoo sat below it, etched along the bone in blue ink: **_uccellino fonda notte._**

The music sank further in volume and anticipation rumbled through the crowd. Maria chuckled in her ear. “I know more than you care to imagine.”

A shiver ran down Shepard’s spine. The sweetness in her voice had melted away and a breathy kind of rage had replaced. Her smile receded as she pulled away. A little green peeked out from behind her pupils. Her fingers brushed over the gap between her collarbones and in a flash, she disappeared behind the counter, her dark curls bouncing as she went.

A sickening feeling overtook Shepard as she stepped back. There was something wrong with the whole scene, something sour lurking beneath the glittering exterior. Shepard looked up into Aria’s throne room, almost expecting to see her blue eyes watching over the spectacle, but the booth was empty. The music rose again, somehow ever louder now, and the crowd jostled to get closer to the bar as the dancers took to the poles.

Shepard gasped as she fought against the surge of limbs and groping fingers. The air seemed thinner in the crowd and her lungs ached by the time she escaped the dizzying heat and stench of rum. She’d never been claustrophobic but something about the prospect of being trampled to death didn’t exactly sound dignified.

Stumbling into an empty booth, she fought to regain her breath. It was quieter further back, quiet enough for Shepard to discover a new ringing in her ears. She sat herself down, a hand over her abdomen, and watched the dancing from afar. At first, she thought it might be difficult to spot Maria in between the lights and quick-moving dances but the girl seemed to stand out amongst the rest. She moved with an ease unlike the others, like the stage was her natural habitat and there wasn’t a soul in the room who could tear her away.

Zaeed found Shepard first, long before the rest of the group had reappeared. He had a glass in hand – whiskey, Shepard guessed, after the smell ignited a wave of adolescent, drunken memories – and he leaned against the booth beside her, watching the rest of the show.

“So you’ve met her?”

Shepard leaned forward, balancing her elbows on her knees, and shook her head. “I’m not sure. Should I have seen her already?”

“Well, you sure as hell weren’t talking to any random stripper,” said Zaeed, laughter rumbling in his voice. “You think she got all those scars from workplace accidents?”

_“I know more than you care to imagine_.”

Shepard swallowed hard against the lump in her throat. She supposed she should’ve felt played, manipulated into sympathising with a girl who’d sooner toyed with her than helped her, but a part of her admired her foresight. There were few better ways to get recon than to get close to the enemy and Maria – or more correctly, Livia – was well-versed in playing the field.

“So how do we talk to her now?” Shepard asked. “She’ll split the moment she thinks we know.”

Zaeed scoffed, downing the remainder of his glass. “You think she hasn’t tried that already? Aria knows most of her tricks. No matter how damn good a spy she is, she can’t get off Omega. Not unless that asari bitch makes it happen.”

“What’d she do to piss Aria off that badly?”

“Fucked if I know. Only met her a few times. And I sure as hell ain’t gonna ask her about it.”

“Too scared, Massani?”

“Better to be cautious than to lose my balls.”

Shepard rolled her eyes but the uneasy feeling in her gut persisted. Across the club, Livia grinned and a wild, feverish ecstasy seemed to lace her movements. Her fingers curled around the pole, her back arching, and as she raised her leg, something silver reflected off the lights shining above her. As she swayed and bent to the music’s rhythm, more flashes of silver bounced off her flesh. _Known for knives_ , Shepard recalled. _Messy. Bloody. Vicious_.

Shepard had to look away. Between her scars, her shimmering eyes and the serrated blades strapped to her body, the infiltrator was an enigma that she couldn’t quite figure out. The shrewdness she’d expected from the psychologist within her was absent in her scarred features. The weariness of a spy was lost on her brash attempts to pull the Commander in. And the supposed brutality with which she could dispatch grown men seemed a far cry from the graceful, fluid movements she displayed on stage. At best, she was crazy. At worst, a liability.

Shepard cracked her knuckles and a rumbling whisper crawled behind her ear. “ _Sometimes crazy is the best way to go._ ”

With a sigh, she tried her best not to let the memory of Wrex’s voice drag her back into ‘the old days’ but there was truth hiding in there somewhere. She never would’ve gotten off Elysium without a bit of crazy, never would’ve chased Saren across systems or stolen the Normandy right off the Citadel docks.

Livia may be crazy but Shepard couldn’t deny that sometimes crazy got the job done.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It may be 1am but I'm determined to get this up, goddamn it, for it's been sitting on my hard drive for weeks. Many apologies for the delay, I just had a large swathe of assessments all in one big chunk and mid-semester break was rather conveniently not put at the mid-point of the semester. Real geniuses up there in admin...
> 
> Regardless, I hope you are all well and that life is treating you as nicely as it can. Remember to drink water, take breaks and to talk to someone if life is, in fact, not treating you as it should. Thanks for all the kudos - I'm very flattered. Hope everyone has a great day. 
> 
> Until next time xxx


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